Receiving a page
A callout needs to reach crew even when their phone is on silent. This page explains how Get Paged does that on iPhone and Android, and how crew stay in control of it.
Only for live callouts. Get Paged only overrides silent mode or Do Not Disturb for live emergency callouts. Everything else uses standard notifications, and these alerts are never used for marketing or general messages.
When a page is sent
A callout is sent when the team has been tasked to a real incident and an authorised member pages the crew. Only members the organisation has authorised can send a callout, such as duty officers and launch authorities. Ordinary crew accounts cannot. See Who can send pages.
Callouts are unpredictable, and for any individual crew member they are infrequent. Crew who are marked as unavailable in the app are not paged.
On iPhone: Critical Alerts
Current status: Get Paged has applied to Apple for permission to use Critical Alerts. Until that permission is granted, callouts are sent as Time Sensitive notifications. These can be delivered during a Focus, but they follow the phone's silent setting. This section sets out how Critical Alerts will be used once permission is granted.
Critical Alerts are an iPhone notification type for urgent safety information. A Critical Alert plays a sound even when the phone is muted or in Do Not Disturb or a Focus. Apple allows only approved apps to use them, and each user must give separate permission before an app can send them.
Get Paged uses Critical Alerts only for live emergency callouts.
Crew are asked to opt in to Critical Alerts during onboarding. iOS shows its own permission prompt, and Critical Alerts stay off unless the crew member allows them. Crew who decline still receive callouts as standard notifications.
Turning Critical Alerts off
- Open the iPhone Settings app.
- Tap Notifications, then Get Paged.
- Turn off Critical Alerts.
On Android
An Android version of Get Paged is on its way. It works the same way as the iPhone app.
On Android, callouts have their own notification category, separate from other Get Paged notifications. With the crew member's permission, callouts can override Do Not Disturb, so they sound even when the phone is otherwise silenced. Android asks for this permission separately, and it stays off unless the crew member allows it. Crew who decline still receive callouts as standard notifications.
Turning it off
- Open the phone's Settings app.
- Tap Apps, then Get Paged, then Notifications.
- Open the callout notifications and turn off Override Do Not Disturb.
Menu names vary slightly between phone makers.
When you are not on call
Crew can mark themselves unavailable in the app, so they are not paged at all during that time. This works the same on iPhone and Android.
Before turning these alerts off, crew should check with their organisation how it expects them to be contactable when on call.