Did you lose an iPhone on the bus between Galway and Doolin?

Does the phone have emergency contacts who you can call? I don't know the steps on an iPhone, but the gist is that you should be able to call those contacts without knowing the password for the phone. Maybe you've already tried that, but if not, an iPhone user should be able up provide the sequence to phone the emergency contacts.

It does not have any emergency contacts. And it’s in airplane mode, so Siri can’t tell me who it belongs to. When I get home, I can take it to an Apple Store and maybe they can help.

Oh that's too bad. I hope you're right!

You would usually pass someone else's phone to the driver if you find it on the bus.

You would usually pass someone else's phone to the driver if you find it on the bus.

Exactly. When the owner realizes it was missing, they would contact the bus company to see if anyone turned it in.

The bus company will say, sorry, no one did. They are out the use of their phone on their trip.

Sadly, you made this a lot more complicated than it had to be.

A few weeks ago at Heathrow, after security as I was putting things back in my bag, I saw a couple of women get up and walk towards their gate. They left a phone on a chair. I couldn't run after them so I handed the phone to a security officer. He took it to the back office. As I was about to leave, the women came back. I asked if they were looking for their phone. They said yes and I told them to talk to the security officer. They did and got their phone back.

If I had taken it hoping to find them, they'd be out a phone.

BTW, Apple will not share personal information with you on another customer. And if it's locked, they won't unlock it for you. It could be stolen. (Which, technically, it is.)

So, the people who lost their phone will have to buy a new iphone and hope any information they need is in the cloud.

It looks, from her previous post, as if the OP was (is?) travelling to Ennis, for a few days before flying home from Shannon. So the OP could hand it in at Ennis Bus Station (on arrival later today, or if already in Ennis whenever convenient), if that is still her current plans.

The OP was clearly trying to be helpful, even if that helpfulness has maybe backfired a bit.

If the OP was going through to Ennis that particular bus sets back off to Galway from Ennis at 1430

I appreciate you wanted to help, but you actually made an already bad situation a lot worse, both for the person the phone belongs to and for yourself. To start with the latter; you taking the phone instead of handing it in to the bus driver can be seen as theft. I know you didn’t mean to, but that is technically what you did. The best thing you can do know is contact the police and report that you found the phone. You should then hand in the phone, preferably to the bus company or the police. Under no circumstance should you take the phone back home with you!!

suzannewilmoth,
Thank you for caring. I know you were chastised in the above posts for not turning the phone in right away. I am positive you meant well. The world needs more people who care about others. Hopefully you were/are able to turn the phone over at the next bus stop.

All the best for a wonderful trip in Ireland.

Traveler Girl

“ If the time notations on the post are correct, the original post went in 1:24 AM Ireland time, followed by 2:55 AM. ”

I don’t think this is correct. The OP was posted at 11:24 AM local time in Ireland, followed by a post 1.5 hours later at 12:55 PM. So the first post was just about half an hour before mid day, the second post by the OP was 1 hour after mid day.

As I write this, it’s almost 3:30 in Ireland. This means the OP still has time to hand in the phone to the bus company or the police.

If the time notations on the post are correct, the original post went in 1:24 AM Ireland time, followed by 2:55 AM

I agree with what dutch traveller wrote. I am in Europe, so the time stamps for me are in Irish/UK time. It looks as if you wrote this post live on the bus- the family from Seattle having probably got off at Lisdoovarna with the bus running 20 minutes late from the tracking data, due to traffic congestion. She got off, the bus departed and you saw the phone on the seat is what I think happened.

That is why I checked the data for the return journey of the bus (probably with the same driver) for you now to take that approach to return the phone.

I can see that you clearly meant well. Perhaps in your on bus conversation the other family said they were RS travellers, hence why you posted here. Probably you hoped this would be an easy fix, just call her up or something.

But it unfortunately isn't, hence the need to turn to plan B return the phone to Bus Eireann.

Dutch_traveler and isn31c, you are of course correct. I don't know why I subtracted rather than adding 5 hours (and somehow had made that error on the initial reading). That made most of that post wrong and I deleted it.

But I remain with "that phone has to get to the bus company post haste and hopefully there can still be a happy ending." I get so frustrated that so many are incapable of logical actions and that everything, including basic research ("e.g., does anyone know this person at this address, I have their package"), can only be done by consulting the hive rather than by direct actions.

Given where we are, thanks, isn31c, for the logical thinking to help her find how to reunite the phone with the bus company to help the owner track it down.

I once horrifyingly left my jacket with passport, credit cards & cash on a bus in Siracusa, Sicily. We realized it as the bus was pulling away so we waited at the bus stop for the next bus. Different driver, but he said to check the police station down the street. And thankfully the original driver had dropped it off there.

It might be easier for Suzanne to drop the phone at a nearby police station rather than trying to find that specific bus or a bus station.

I found the phone’s owner and have put it in the mail to them. Yay! Just as I surmised, it belonged to one of the children who got off of the bus while we waited to board. I only noticed the phone after we had been on the bus for about thirty minutes, so obviously I couldn't ask the driver to hold up a second. Although I considered handing it to the driver, he didn't inspire confidence. Once we figured out how to get the phone out of airplane mode, it was simple to make contact.

Pleased that this story has a happy ending.

I'm pleased it ended happily too. Thread looks incomplete without a big golden padlock from Webmaster now.

Thanks for being a wonderful caring individual. There is great joy in a situation ending well. I’ve been the benefactor of others caring act. One notable situation - back in the mid 1990’s I placed a special order at a small family run/owned business in a small New England town in a state about a five hours drive from my home state. About a week later I received an envelope from an unknown individual with just under $100 and a detailed note inside. Apparently as I was leaving the shop while fumbling in my pockets money fell out. A passersby noticed but could not get my attention quickly enough. Rather than turn the money into the place that I had just left they spoke with the shop owner and managed to retrieve enough information to subsequently secure an address and return the funds to me. The business owner may or may not have been willing to get involved but they certainly provided my name perhaps even my address - absolutely no judgement there. It was an incredulous act of kindness for which I was greatly appreciative. I also changed the way that I handled money and other personal items after that.