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Rethinking Phones, Part I: The Landline
A few of my favorite personal finance bloggers have published their spending, by category, for 2014. As a result, the other day I found myself thinking, "Why are we spending $53/month to let telemarketers bother us?" (Also, poll takers, charities, and people who want to tell us how to vote. And clicking devices.)
I'm not sure. So now, even though I actually asked one of my friends not to do this, I'm re-thinking the landline. So why, exactly, do we have one?
* Because we've always had one (yes, I can face the truth).
* Because sometimes you want to call a household and not try to pick which person to call.
* Because, although I heard that the phone company did studies to find the worst possible reception that was good enough and offered that, the reception really is good enough. By which I mean good.
* Because landlines work when other things don't work (like when the electricity is out).
Yet most young adults don't even have landlines. Surely, they're not all crazy. After doing research, it seems like there are only three reasons that bloggers admit to keeping their landlines: 1) they are bundled with something they want, 2) they are for the kids to use (and not rack up terrible charges), and/or 3) when you call 911 they automatically know your location. Our landline is not bundled with anything, we don't have any kids, and I've already been trained that when you call 911, the first thing you tell them is your location, so it didn't even click with me that this is no longer necessary for landlines.
So, now that times have changed, how are we actually using our landline? Here's what I can recall:
* To receive unwanted phone calls.
* To have something to fill in on forms where a phone number is required without having to give out our cell phone numbers.
* To get calls from my mom, dad, and brother, and occasionally my sister (my sister prefers chatting online and has also requested that I get Skype).
* To get calls from our mutual friend D, mainly when she can't reach us on a cell.
* To get calls from Robin's friend, JA.
* To get reminders we don't need about doctor and dentist appointments and prescriptions that are ready.
* To call our internet company when the internet is down.
Basically, we get about one call a day that we don't want and just a couple of calls per month that we actually want on the landline. We are happy giving out cell phone numbers to the people from whom we like receiving calls. And those people, except for D who is generally trying to get a hold of either of us, do generally have a particular person in mind when they call, though I suspect JA doesn't mind getting the wrong person. We also don't worry about needing to slip in a 911 phone call in just a few seconds before losing consciousness.
In fact in these modern times, I prefer e-mail for long-distance communication. I still do want to be reachable by phone, though. Just maybe not enough to pay $53/month. The obvious alternative is to just use cell phones.
I've heard that most college students today do not like talking on the phone. They prefer texting. When I first heard that, I thought it was an interesting cultural phenomenon. Now I suspect that it's because cell phone reception is so terrible. This is one of those things one would hope I would be out of date on--that these days reception is much better than in ancient times. Or that the bad reception I get when certain people call me is due to them calling me while driving in and out of good zones. However, many, if not most, phone calls I got from students at my last job had very bad reception. My last job took place entirely in the year 2014, which even young people will admit was not all that different from modern times.
So, I have questions for you, dear readers.
1) If you don't have a landline, how do you deal with businesses insisting on getting a phone number? Do you just give them your cell phone number? Can you give a fake 555 number? Are there phone number sharing services out there where a bunch of people can give out the same phone number for businesses that should never need to call them? Probably it's not really a problem because they don't actually call.
2) If you use a cell phone (ha! that's all of you!) how is your cell phone reception? In really bad cases, I can understand what people are saying if they just say each word two or three times. No one ever stoops to this, though, do they? You just say "what" a lot, right?
3) Any other comments or advice on the issue of whether to have a landline?
Bumper Sticker of the Day - If the environment were a bank, it would already have been saved.
Yowsa.
I'm not sure. So now, even though I actually asked one of my friends not to do this, I'm re-thinking the landline. So why, exactly, do we have one?
* Because we've always had one (yes, I can face the truth).
* Because sometimes you want to call a household and not try to pick which person to call.
* Because, although I heard that the phone company did studies to find the worst possible reception that was good enough and offered that, the reception really is good enough. By which I mean good.
* Because landlines work when other things don't work (like when the electricity is out).
Yet most young adults don't even have landlines. Surely, they're not all crazy. After doing research, it seems like there are only three reasons that bloggers admit to keeping their landlines: 1) they are bundled with something they want, 2) they are for the kids to use (and not rack up terrible charges), and/or 3) when you call 911 they automatically know your location. Our landline is not bundled with anything, we don't have any kids, and I've already been trained that when you call 911, the first thing you tell them is your location, so it didn't even click with me that this is no longer necessary for landlines.
So, now that times have changed, how are we actually using our landline? Here's what I can recall:
* To receive unwanted phone calls.
* To have something to fill in on forms where a phone number is required without having to give out our cell phone numbers.
* To get calls from my mom, dad, and brother, and occasionally my sister (my sister prefers chatting online and has also requested that I get Skype).
* To get calls from our mutual friend D, mainly when she can't reach us on a cell.
* To get calls from Robin's friend, JA.
* To get reminders we don't need about doctor and dentist appointments and prescriptions that are ready.
* To call our internet company when the internet is down.
Basically, we get about one call a day that we don't want and just a couple of calls per month that we actually want on the landline. We are happy giving out cell phone numbers to the people from whom we like receiving calls. And those people, except for D who is generally trying to get a hold of either of us, do generally have a particular person in mind when they call, though I suspect JA doesn't mind getting the wrong person. We also don't worry about needing to slip in a 911 phone call in just a few seconds before losing consciousness.
In fact in these modern times, I prefer e-mail for long-distance communication. I still do want to be reachable by phone, though. Just maybe not enough to pay $53/month. The obvious alternative is to just use cell phones.
I've heard that most college students today do not like talking on the phone. They prefer texting. When I first heard that, I thought it was an interesting cultural phenomenon. Now I suspect that it's because cell phone reception is so terrible. This is one of those things one would hope I would be out of date on--that these days reception is much better than in ancient times. Or that the bad reception I get when certain people call me is due to them calling me while driving in and out of good zones. However, many, if not most, phone calls I got from students at my last job had very bad reception. My last job took place entirely in the year 2014, which even young people will admit was not all that different from modern times.
So, I have questions for you, dear readers.
1) If you don't have a landline, how do you deal with businesses insisting on getting a phone number? Do you just give them your cell phone number? Can you give a fake 555 number? Are there phone number sharing services out there where a bunch of people can give out the same phone number for businesses that should never need to call them? Probably it's not really a problem because they don't actually call.
2) If you use a cell phone (ha! that's all of you!) how is your cell phone reception? In really bad cases, I can understand what people are saying if they just say each word two or three times. No one ever stoops to this, though, do they? You just say "what" a lot, right?
3) Any other comments or advice on the issue of whether to have a landline?
Bumper Sticker of the Day - If the environment were a bank, it would already have been saved.
Yowsa.
no subject
As for 911, cell phones generally work when the power's out. The only phone lines that wouldn't are DSL phone lines. In fact, the sorts of things that take the power out are just as likely to take down the phone lines as well!
And why are you paying $53/month? When we canceled our landline, we weren't paying more than $20/month! Cancel it--that's another weekend vacation every year!
no subject
down with house phones
* My cell phone reception is generally fine.
* I don't prefer talking on the phone; for most of my friends I use texts
or email. I've sort of lost the knack of talking on the phone and in general I prefer asynchronous communication methods.
* It's easy to text multiple people at once if what you want to say is "hey, so-and-so household, are you guys home?" or whatever.
* I give businesses my cell phone number but that's because it's just my phone. I don't have a problem with getting a lot of business calls. My phone makes it easy to block callers who annoy me (e.g., Sirius/XM radio). Calls from my doctor and so on are calls I WANT to get.
* If you need 'another' phone number, you can get a Google Voice number. It's free and you can either have those calls routed to a phone or phones of your choice, or just receive voice mails from that number on your computer or via email or text or by calling in. So if you just want a voice mail box that doesn't ring anywhere, it is easy and free to set that up.
* Cell phones also work when the power is out, at least until they run out of charge. Unless the cell phone tower is down, and then maybe not.
* I think 911 can get your location from a cell phone now, at least some of the time. However, the location aspect is useful for home phones because a person who calls 911 from your house may not know the address. (For instance, I don't know your address off the top of my head, so if I called 911 from your house I wouldn't know how to tell them where I was.)
* It's nice not having to have phones set up in the house.
I definitely would not pay $600 a year to have a phone in my house, even though I'm not as thrifty as you (though I am poorer, so it may balance out).
- Tam
Re: down with house phones
It looks like it's long past time to pull ourselves into the modern era.
no subject
1) I give my cell phone number to businesses when needed and this has never been an issue or even a minor annoyance. I believe there are different rules for calling cell phones, and you can always add your number to the Do Not Call registry. There are also apps that will let you send spam calls directly to voicemail -- the one business that called me multiple times in the past is now blocked in this way and it's been fine. I should add that I screen my calls as a matter of course if I don't recognize the number.
2) Since beginning my new job, I have invested in a very fancy Bluetooth headset that is apparently very popular with long haul truckers. The sound is crystal clear and right in my ear, and I now hate making any calls without the headset. It is the Blue Parrot brand and is around $50. This has completely solved the reception issue for me.
3) I sometimes feel that I "should" have a landline for emergencies, but honestly, that's probably an outdated idea, and obviously I have done nothing about this in the past 10 years and neither has my husband, so....
4) $53 per month seems ridiculously high for a landline. If you do want to keep it for some reason, I would suggest shopping around. But it doesn't sound like you need one.
no subject
no subject
(Anonymous) 2015-02-15 07:54 pm (UTC)(link)I have a landline - well, actually it's a digital service through my cable modem, but it's mostly the same. I switched recently because the phone service in my neighborhood is so terrible with lines that are over 60 years old that the phone would go out every time it rained. I bought a battery for the cable modem so it still works if the power goes out.
Anyhow, if my life were different I could see switching to a cell phone, but since CatMan and I live under different roofs and spend 3-4 hours per day on the phone, I just can't see going without a landline. Even if the cell phone reception is good, there is still the fact that they cut out if both people say something simultaneously which just drives me CRAZY! And that's just a feature of the technology so it's not likely to change.
I should add that I don't have a smartphone - yes, I'm the one. I have an ancient flip phone on a pre-paid plan which costs me about $50 annually. I use it just for emergencies - so I take it with me but leave it turned off.
Perhaps this makes me sound crazy, but all of the stuff built into smartphones sorta makes me nervous... like I'm being tracked with the GPS or something. Plus, I totally HATE the idea of being available to the world 24/7. If I'm out on a long bike ride, I want to be on a bike ride - I don't want the world following me around.
I know you could turn the thing off, but I fear temptation might get the better of me. I could see wanting to use some app to track my ride and then getting calls while I'm out. This is why I cancelled my Facebook account. I would login for some reason and forget to shut down the window, then some stupid person who wouldn't give me the time of day back in high school would suddenly decide they wanted to "chat!" AAAARRRG! Made me crazy, and made me feel like "stalkerbook" would be a more appropriate name. I should also mention that I haven't any clue how to send or receive a text message - I also sorta dislike the idea. It feels like an intrusion to me.
I dunno. There may come a point when I'll get pushed into the 21st century. I may need to get a smartphone to be able to test some applications that I'm working on for real instead of on a simulator. But I'm really not wild about the idea. I just like the simplicity of being where I am, rather than carrying my world with me wherever I go. I know I'm in the minority on that one, but I don't see making any changes to my setup in the near future.
-Cat
no subject
I'm sickened that your landlines aren't well maintained. From my perspective, it looks like you also got rid of your landline and replaced it with a digital service through your cable modem.
I'm still on Facebook--fortunately, only people I actually like try to chat with me there. And if they didn't, I can just ignore them. I certainly ignore the friend requests of people I don't know very well (unless, after looking at their posts, I decide they look interesting enough).
I think I'll be able to keep my phone off when I don't want calls. But I do understand the fear of turning into one of those people who is always focused on what's inside their phone to the detriment of cool things going on outside their phone.