Fine my iPhone App saved the day!

[NotaGeek]

A note to iPhone users out there -- the Find my iPhone App by Apple is now free for iPhone users and it saved me ... take the time to download and set it up!

Yesterday I went to the grocery store on the bus and picked up WAY too many things and it started raining like crazy while I was in the store so I decided my normal quick bus ride and walk home wasn't gonna happen. (SO typical for Seattle! :rain:)

Anyway, I got a cab to take me home (a chaep $5 with tip!) and just as I pulled up to my place my boyfriend texted me and I read the text and shoved my phone in my jacket pocket and somehow dropped my phone IN THE CAB!! :drive:

Once I got my groceries in the house and dried off I went to look for my phone to answer my text, and much to my terror I realized my iPhone 4 was gone -- and on VIBRATE!

I immediately signed into the Find my iPhone site on my lap top and it used the phones GPS to show me it's location -- driving Northbound on the I5 freeway! One of the features of the App is the ability to sound a 2 minute alert with a message on the phone while locking down its contents (I always use the lock anyway, so that wasn't a problem) -- but the BEST feature is that if you can't recover the phone the App can wipe the phone and get rid of all your information!

I called Yellow Cab and through their dispatch and their cab's GPS we narrowed down which cab it was and along the message alert I sent giving my hardly used land line number (thank goodness for that package deal from Comcast!) and the really honest cab driver I got my phone back 45 minutes later at the cost of a $20 tip instead of $600 for a new iPhone!

Take if from me -- set up your Find my iPhone app! :thumbsup:

[SBETigg]

Wow, so glad you found it!

[faline]

Whew! Michael, you must have been so relieved to get it back and so quickly!!!

[ElenitaB]

Thanks for the tip, Michael. :thumbsup:

Wish I had known about this app last Tuesday... my son fell asleep in a cab on his way home from Manhattan and his phone must have slipped out of his pocket. I reported it immediately to the taxi commission but to no avail. :( (Dummy me... never occurred to me to call it.)

[princessjojo]

I was talking with one of my patients about his iPad just the other day and this same conversation came about.

He was telling me how while leaving a hospital other than mine, he had given his iPad to a friend to hold while he went to get the car. When his friend got out of the wheelchair, he left the iPad in the chair and they began the 2hr drive home. When he got home, he realized it wasn't there, and used his iPhone to connect to the same app, Find my iPad. He noticed it wasn't where it was left, drove back to the hospital and hospital security said too bad so sad, while all along he was showing them, it's been moved now, to this parking lot over there. The security guard wanted to do nothing but say too bad. My patient then called the police to humor himself, the police drove all 3 of them over to the parking lot, and found it's location. Well I'll be darned if it wasn't there on the front seat of a car. They waited and a staff member of the hospital came out, was confronted by the policeman, tried to claim it, but failed. He was arrested for stealing and then fired.

Point is, it also saved him a large amount of money. It was well worth it to download it.

Glad you got your phone back!!!

[DizneyRox]

I've been using an app called Navimote available through the Cydia Store. Sounds pretty similar, although doesn't lock anything down, etc.

I'll have to check this out...

DOH! Free for iPhone 4 only on iOS 4.2... Thanks anyway...