Eventually the time will come when you are faced with the prospect of needing to replace your nursery pager system. This could be for any number of reasons, such as your current system being unable to meet expanding needs or just that the technology becoming burnt out and redundant.
Initially, pager systems were either wired or wireless based. With the ever increasing progress of technology, wireless has overcome the wired system, which was typically a traditional LCD display mounted to a highly visible area. However, with the introduction of systems such as the iPad and SMS paging, the technology solution to consider for a replacement has become, well, quite more complex.
Today, the nursery paging environment can now be deployed via a multitude of devices. Wireless, wired and now SMS. Yes, and now the trend for these is undeniably shifting towards a system that utilizes a patron’s existing mobile phone or equivalent- SMS paging.
The incumbent nursery pager providers, whose interests are in generally very expensive paging systems, will argue the point that SMS paging is still a truly untried solution, and not everyone carries an SMS-capable mobile phone. This may be the case, but I’m guessing that less than 5% of the population DON’T own a mobile phone, let alone those that actually put their children in some kind of childcare.
As with all technology, this can all be very confusing – and at the time of writing this post I am yet to locate a single iPad nursery application system on the market. However, I’m sure several will be available within the next 6-12 months.
Back to the question at hand though.
A major consideration when upgrading your nursery paging system is whether or not you can you sell your current system? This could radically reduce the cost of your upgrade investment. Obviously this is not really an option if your current system has passed its use-by-date, but if the unit is still in working order, or even just some of the components, then this is certainly an option.
If you are simply looking to upgrade, and looking at using the same provider and deployment, then you may be able to trade-in your current system.
Possibly you could still retain the same base unit, and upgrade the pagers themselves, or even vice versa. In this instance, it would be wise to contact the vendor who supplied your current systems and discuss what options that may be available to you.
If possible, talk to other users about the systems they are using. This will help to evaluate your next system with getting some real user feedback.
Tags: ipad nursery pager, nursery pager solution, nursery pager upgrade, sms nursery paging, used nursery pager, wired nursery paging
We have a check in system at our church with a numbering system but I need to purchase a paging system where we can put the child’s number in and that number will display on the screen in our sanctuary. Do you have a system like this? Thank you for your help.
Hi Pam
How do you want to operate the paging display, i.e. from a PC, dedicated unit or cellphone? And does it need to be integrated with your check-in system?
And how would you want the number displayed in your sanctuary, a simple LED display (with one or more displays), or integrated into an existing TV display?
Mike