phone number format (with or without "+1") in explore.garmin.com contacts

My contacts nearly all have US phone numbers. The explore.garmin.com contacts web page shows "United States" in the drop down box before the phone number. But it shows some numbers with the "+1" in front and others without. The edit link on the contact page won't change the number, and I don't know which version is correct anyway. Can someone please tell me (1) if it makes a difference, (2) which displayed version is correct and (3) how I change the number if I need to?

0 twolpert over 3 years ago

Ultimately, any phone number to which the device sends an SMS MUST include the country code (the +1 for the US).

There is no way to justify the vagaries in the UI. If everything was working correctly when editing an existing contact, changing the country code in the drop-down would change the country code for the corresponding phone number. This does not appear to work for "edit" operations on existing contacts. SO, if you change the country code, you should do so BOTH in the drop-down and in the number itself.

When you add a new contact, you should choose the country code from the drop-down, enter the number without the country code, and save. The net result as displayed will include both the number and the country code.

Yeah, it's bad UI design, but it has always been that way.

I am not sure what you mean when you say "...edit link on the contact page won't change the number...". You CAN edit the number there, but changing the country code in the drop-down does not change the country code embedded in the existing number. As noted above, you should change both the drop-down AND the code shown in the number so that they are consistent. BTW, if you change the drop-down only, you WILL get an error when you click Done.

0 jlg2 over 3 years ago in reply to twolpert

Thanks, twolpert. I agree with everything you said. But that doesn't answer my question. My goal is to ensure my 66i can easily communicate with my contacts when I am off the grid. Does it matter whether the "+1" is displayed in the contact? I haven't had a problem before. I just want to confirm that it doesn't matter whether the "+1" is shown in the contact. And if it does, which way is correct? And can I change it by deleting the contact and adding it again?

To answer your question, about changing the number in the contact, I was not able to do it with the edit user interface. You may have checked and thought you changed it. But if I open the contact after changing the "+1" in the phone number, There has been no change.

0 twolpert over 3 years ago in reply to jlg2

The country code (+1 for US) MUST be present in the phone number field IF the country code is shown in the number field wherever you are in the UI.

As long as I changed BOTH the country code drop-down and the country code shown in the number field TO MATCH, I had no problems saving the change.

0 jlg2 over 3 years ago in reply to twolpert

Thanks, twolpert.

You say you had no problem making the change. But did you reopen the contact after closing it to see if the change was made? If I do that, I find the change has not been made.

Assuming the correct code is shown in the country code dropdown box, why do you think the "+1" needs to be displayed in the number field?

0 twolpert over 3 years ago in reply to jlg2

Yes, I verified that it was saved.

I do not know WHY the UI is designed the way it is. All I can do is try to figure out what works and what does not. The way I see this is that we should look at the resulting new contact immediately after a successful add. ANY edit we subsequently perform on an existing contact should result in data which is in the same format as that of a new contact.

SO, I start by creating a new contact, choose US (+1) form the drop-down, enter a number (without entering the +1), and save the result. If I then select that contact in the contact list, the resulting "read only" pane on the right shows +1 followed by the number I entered. This is what we expect. If I then click the Edit button, the resulting editable pane shows the +1 US selected in the drop-down. AND it shows +1 followed by the number in the number field.

From this, I conclude that ANY edit I make must end up in that same state. That is, the proper country code (new or old, depending on whether or not I changed it) selected in the drop-down AND that same country code showing up in the number field.

As far as I can tell, if I do it this way, I can save any (otherwise correct) change. And see it again when I re-open the edit pane.

If you have any doubt about getting this right, just delete the contact and re-enter it. You can't do that with "your conact", which must be updated on the account tab. I did not try it, but I would think that same rules would apply there. I would also think that changing the country code for numbers associated with the account would be very unusual.