VTech SN7021 Cordless 2-Way Weather-Resistant Audio Doorbell for SN5127 & SN5147 Senior Phone Systems

First of all, I love the concept of a cohesive phone system for elderly or impaired. I just finished setting up the phone base and several add-on handsets, plus the doorbells and SOS pendent. All of the normal setup of a multi-phone setup is pretty much what you would expect and straightforward and has nice features that drove me to buy this.The part that really seems clunky and disconnected are the add-on devices (pendant and doorbells). The doorbells have some configuration that you would expect, like naming them (front door, back door, etc.), as well as setting the chime sounds and volume. Now for the part that I can't understand...when the doorbell button is pressed, all of the phones play the chime...and play it...and play it...it never seems to stop until you pick up the phone and either answer the doorbell (like an intercom) or cancel it on a handset. Maybe there is a timeout that I haven't hit with them yet, but we have let in ring about 10 times to see if it ever just gives up. It seems like that should be configurable in case you don't have the handset, so it could act more like a normal doorbell to some extent.The SOS pendant is another great feature but lacks documentation. If you change the default message, it would be nice to have an example to know what the person on the receiving end of the call needs to be told. Apparently, the older models acted more like an intercom as opposed to these newer models that will just send an alarm to all of the handsets, then will start calling the SOS numbers in sequential order until someone picks up, then the person needing help might be able to communicate if they were reasonably close to one of the handsets. Having the pendant and a handset with you would be the best bet if two-way communication was ever needed. It looks like the button would be too easy to accidentally hit on the pendant as well so time will tell if the false alarms will be an issue.

I purchased with other Vtech items for my ageing parents and I was super disappointed with the condition this unit arrived in. The batteries had exploded so I'm glad they were in a separate bag, however, the paint on the unit was flaking and made the unit look very old. I haven't yet tested the functionality as I'm having so much trouble with other features of other accessories but this is likely going back.