Help my elderly parents organize their digital lives
September 13, 2024 10:47 PM Subscribe
My parents are in their late 80s and I'm noticing that more and more of our time together is spent helping them stay on top of basic daily online tasks: keeping track of accounts, logins, passwords, emails and notifications for banks and utilities and memberships. We need help.
My parents have always been very independent, but things are getting to the point with this stuff where they need more help than I can provide on a regular basis as an only child and single dad. We're talking passwords scrawled on scraps of paper and driving to the nearest Verizon office for an hour for the smallest question.
Getting them switched to a new phone and internet provider has been weeks of agony in large part because they get flustered quickly and basic details start to slip through the cracks. Sometimes they don't know what they're signed up for or with who. They can still do it themselves, but it needs to be organized, streamlined and simplified, like iPhone Senior Mode for everything.
We all agree we need someone to come to their house, sit down with them and go through all of it, like I've been trying to do piecemeal for so long. A full digital housecleaning and organizing: Master list of accounts, logins, passwords. Make sure they're getting the notifications they need and not the ones they don't, to the right email addresses, not spam. Everything set up on both their laptop and their phones.
Most importantly, getting it all clearly explained and written down somewhere for when questions inevitably arise.
I understand people who do this are called digital organizers or digital concierges. But I'm not having any luck finding any where we live in Portland, OR, let alone ones who specialize in seniors. With all this sensitive data--and with their waning tech literacy--this pretty much has to be in person. What can we do?
My parents have always been very independent, but things are getting to the point with this stuff where they need more help than I can provide on a regular basis as an only child and single dad. We're talking passwords scrawled on scraps of paper and driving to the nearest Verizon office for an hour for the smallest question.
Getting them switched to a new phone and internet provider has been weeks of agony in large part because they get flustered quickly and basic details start to slip through the cracks. Sometimes they don't know what they're signed up for or with who. They can still do it themselves, but it needs to be organized, streamlined and simplified, like iPhone Senior Mode for everything.
We all agree we need someone to come to their house, sit down with them and go through all of it, like I've been trying to do piecemeal for so long. A full digital housecleaning and organizing: Master list of accounts, logins, passwords. Make sure they're getting the notifications they need and not the ones they don't, to the right email addresses, not spam. Everything set up on both their laptop and their phones.
Most importantly, getting it all clearly explained and written down somewhere for when questions inevitably arise.
I understand people who do this are called digital organizers or digital concierges. But I'm not having any luck finding any where we live in Portland, OR, let alone ones who specialize in seniors. With all this sensitive data--and with their waning tech literacy--this pretty much has to be in person. What can we do?
Thanks for the mention, rrrrrrrrrrt! I’m traveling, or else I would give a longer reply, but I have two suggestions.
First, follow the above instructions to use the NAPO search, but instead of using the “seniors” selection under the residential dropdown, I suggest you use “digital organizing.” Residential organizers who specialize in digital organizing work with seniors all the time. (Business organizers may or may not. Many of us work in both areas, but digital organizing work with business clients can be quite different.,)
Second, off the top of my head I can definitely recommend Megan Spears, whose name that will pop up under both “seniors” and “digital.” She is a longtime colleague, and a fellow Certified Professional Organizer.”
I will be back at my computer on Monday morning, so feel free to MeMail me if you have any questions about the process of using a professional organizer’s services.
posted by The Wrong Kind of Cheese at 7:31 AM on September 14 [8 favorites]
First, follow the above instructions to use the NAPO search, but instead of using the “seniors” selection under the residential dropdown, I suggest you use “digital organizing.” Residential organizers who specialize in digital organizing work with seniors all the time. (Business organizers may or may not. Many of us work in both areas, but digital organizing work with business clients can be quite different.,)
Second, off the top of my head I can definitely recommend Megan Spears, whose name that will pop up under both “seniors” and “digital.” She is a longtime colleague, and a fellow Certified Professional Organizer.”
I will be back at my computer on Monday morning, so feel free to MeMail me if you have any questions about the process of using a professional organizer’s services.
posted by The Wrong Kind of Cheese at 7:31 AM on September 14 [8 favorites]
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When I search the directory at NAPO’s website, within 25 miles of Portland I find 19 people who listed themselves under NAPO’s “senior” category for personal organization. I hope you find the help you need!
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 12:19 AM on September 14 [5 favorites]