Touchscreen Phones — Scope | Disability forum
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Touchscreen Phones

Nilesh
Nilesh Community member Posts: 1 Listener

I have cerebral palsy which affects my fine motor control as such is difficult to use a touchscreen mobile phone without extensive practice, trying different keyboard layouts provided on the Android market etc.

I am looking to move to using a touchscreen phone as I'd rather not discount myself and I realise that technology is moving in this direction, as a MSc graduate in Computer Science myself I wrote a dissertation based on the difficulty I have!

My question is this: is there any way of getting mobile providers to offer a return to base warranty so as to provide me with a practice period, and in the event the use of such a device proves too difficult, I could return the device and terminate any contract for a full refund.

The only way I can personally think of doing this is to buy the phone online and use the Distance Selling Rules to return the phone with two weeks? But ideally I'd need a month to 90 days if possible, but the phones aren't able to provide this from experience.


Hope the above scenario makes sense. Any advice would be greatly appreciate. This must be a common problem surely?

Comments

  • Noah
    Noah Community member Posts: 425 Pioneering
    Hi Nilesh,

    Thanks for posting on the forum,

    I have had similar problems with being able to successfully use my smart phone due to my CP and being quite clumsy fingered! I have had some degree of success with making use of the voice reconigion function. Having the biggest possible screen I have found helpful, as everything is bigger so you don't have to be so accurate with your fingers! I also use a 3x4 smart keyboard pro app with predictive text to help with input, rather than the default qwerty keyboard which I find the buttons are too small on.

    On the subject of trying to get 60-90 day trial of a phone to see if you can manage it, I would suggest talking to all the major mobile network suppliers on the high street and fully explain your situation, make sure you speak with the store managers. They may have loan phones available that you can try out, although in my experience they normally only allow them out for 2-4 weeks. But that maybe a good start....

    Please let us know how you get on

    Noah

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