What to Do When Your Phone is Broken

There are some interesting and proactive steps to take after crashing an expensive smartphone which might cause the owner a headache.

 

A cracked screen or broken phone doesn’t necessarily signal the end of that phone, there are ways to make the best of the circumstance enough to get it to favour you.

Here are six useful things to do when you’ve broken your phone:

 

Get a screen protector

 

This is especially useful when your phone screen is cracked. Using a screen protector can help stop the spread of the cracking, and help maintain the phone long enough for you to change the screen or get a new phone.

 

Leave in raw rice

 

If your phone accidentally falls in water body and you are unable to get it out quickly, immediately turn it off, remove all removable parts, dry them off, stick the phone in some rice or a bunch of silica packets, and let it sit there for three days. Chances are you would be able to save the phone and continue using it to meet your gadgetry and telecommunication needs. For newer phones, you probably have nothing to worry about if the phone accidentally gets into water for a couple of seconds. But if the phone has been in there longer than its IP rating, then you can apply the above steps and pray it works.

 

Ask a friend for an old phone

 

If your phone is broken and there is nothing you can do to fix it, you can try asking for a friend’s old phone. Sure, it might be a much older and somewhat outdated model, but it will be able to meet your basic telecommunication needs until you are able to get a new phone. You can get a new battery for the phone so that battery-wise, the phone can function like brand new (that could offer some solace to you in the meantime). You can also consider using parts of the old phone to fix your broken phone, if there is a possibility to do that.

Attempt a repair

 

If you have the money and consider it worth it, you can give the phone to a technician to help repair it. It might not be so cheap, but it might be cheaper than buying a new phone all together. Do your research well and find good technicians that can help with the phone, not a charlatan that will attempt to use the outlet to milk you dry. In addition, if you are industrious, have the expertise and feel up to challenge, you can attempt to repair the phone yourself. You can use some Youtube DIY videos to guide you. You can save yourself some money in the process.

 

Sell the phone

 

You can always sell your broken phone. You definitely would not be able to get much from it, but you might be able to get a reasonable amount to recoup some of the money you have already lost. Do your homework, do the ‘maths’ and try to figure out the actual worth of your broken phone before trying to sell it (so you are not cheated and are able to get your money’s worth out of it). Besides, in doing so you might realise it is better to just fix the phone if you can. Also, if it makes financial sense, you can fix the phone and then sell it to maximise your gain from selling the phone.

 

Buy a new one

 

If you can afford it, and your phone is broken, you can buy a new one. You can gather some money together, and if you sold the broken phone, add the proceeds to this money you have gathered and get a new and probably better phone. It depends on you.

When News Breaks Out, We Break In. (The 2014 Bloggies Finalist)