Before You Hand a Family Member a Refurbished Phone
A cheap way to get a parent or child onto a good device — with a short checklist so it is reliable, not just working on day one.
September 2026 · 5 min read
Why Refurbished Is a Good Call for a Family Phone
For a parent who mainly needs calls, WhatsApp, and to be reachable, or a child getting their first handset, a refurbished mid-range phone from two or three years ago is often a better buy than a brand-new entry-level one. You get a better screen, a better battery, and more RAM for the same money, which matters because a phone that is always a little short on memory is exactly the kind that struggles to keep a location app running in the background.
The catch is that a refurbished phone comes with an unknown history. The checklist below is about closing that gap.
First: Confirm the Device Itself Is Clean
It was factory reset and is not signed into anyone else's Google account. If it asks for a previous owner's Google login on setup, that is a locked device — return it.
Check the IMEI on the Sanchar Saathi portal to confirm it is not reported lost or stolen. Dial *#06# to see the IMEI.
Run all system updates before anything else. Settings, then System, then software update. An out-of-date phone misbehaves in ways that are hard to diagnose later.
Check the battery health if the brand exposes it, or just watch how fast it drains on the first day. A tired battery is the number one reason a refurbished phone drops off the map overnight.
Then: Set Up Raksha and Make It Stick
Installing the app and logging in with the family member's number is the easy part — the account follows the number, not the device, so their place in the circle comes straight back. What actually needs attention on a refurbished phone is making sure it keeps working after a few days:
- Grant location as "Allow all the time", not "only while using the app". This is the setting that lets arrival alerts and live location work when the phone is in a pocket.
- Turn off battery optimisation for Raksha. On Xiaomi, Realme, Vivo, Oppo, and Samsung, find the app in battery settings and set it to "no restrictions" or "allow background activity". Refurbished phones from these brands often ship with aggressive defaults.
- Enable autostart if the brand has it (common on Xiaomi and Realme) so the app comes back after a restart.
- Restart the phone and wait a day. Then check from your own phone that their location is still updating. If it went stale, one of the settings above did not take.
Finally: A Two-Minute Live Check With Them
Before it becomes their everyday phone, do a quick joint test while you are still together. Have them walk out of the house and around the block. You watch their dot move on your phone. Then have them press SOS once so they know what it looks like and you confirm it lands on your side. Two minutes now saves a confused phone call in three weeks.
For an older parent: also set up their emergency contacts and the phone's built-in accessibility options — larger text, higher contrast — while you have it in your hands.