Dumping landline phone service?

[OrangeKrush]

I knew it was the ol timers holding out!

We did away with ours 10 years ago, I'll be glad when the neighbors down the road get rid of theirs.. I'll get rid of that half busted open leaning tower of a junction box at the edge of my property. Most you see are mowed over and don't look functional. Most probably aren't.

 

[Henro]

Thanks for all the insight!

Was remembering that last year the jack that connects or base station for wireless phones fell out. So we effectively had no landline in use for who knows how many weeks or longer. Do not remember what caused me to check into the issue and find the reason.

Anyway, looks like we will soon dump the landline. But I remember asking Verizon about this in the past, and at that point the answer was essentially "If you cancel the phone service, but keep internet and TV, you end up saving maybe five bucks, due to our pricing schedule..." or something like that.

When I do it, I will report back with the savings...not optimistic I will save much, but I will see what Verizon is doing today.

We have access to either Verizon or Comcast where we live. Unfortunately they are both basturds...

...for lack of a better term.

 

[mwemaxxowner]

I have not had a land line since 2008. Sure don't miss it.

 

[GreensvilleJay]

What I find interesting is some companies will only accept a FAX .

 

[fried1765]

Good luck at renewal time!!

Renewal is guaranteed at $69.99 per month for three years.
There are also competing providers now!
I do not expect to be even a little bit worried at "renewal time".
I'll take the lowest price for a year any time, especially when that low price saves me $1648 for the year.

 

[DustyRusty]

If I dumped our landlines (2), we would be without the ability to call police or fire departments. The closes cell tower is in the next state about 4 miles away, and service is horrible once the leaves are on the trees. Winter isn't too bad, but even then, if you need to call for assistance on 911, you don't know who is going to pick up the call, since that tower directs 911 calls to both MA and CT operators. Had that happen last year when I called 911 to report a MVA (motor vehicle accident) that happened in MA near the CT border. The call went to the CT911 operator, who had to redirect it to the MA911 operator, who then redirected it to the MA State Police, who then forwarded it to the correct municipality for a response. By then someone else had notified the municipality PD and they arrived on the scene by the time that I was able to give the dispatcher the information. If the MVA had happened in CT, CT State Police would take a minimum of 30 minutes to respond. If there were injuries, they would have to request mutual aid from MA municipality's ambulance service. Needless to say that these types of issues are the exception but at least with the landline, we can get to the agency that we need without much delay.

 

[Henro]

If I dumped our landlines (2), we would be without the ability to call police or fire departments. The closes cell tower is in the next state about 4 miles away, and service is horrible once the leaves are on the trees. Winter isn't too bad, but even then, if you need to call for assistance on 911, you don't know who is going to pick up the call, since that tower directs 911 calls to both MA and CT operators. Had that happen last year when I called 911 to report a MVA (motor vehicle accident) that happened in MA near the CT border. The call went to the CT911 operator, who had to redirect it to the MA911 operator, who then redirected it to the MA State Police, who then forwarded it to the correct municipality for a response. By then someone else had notified the municipality PD and they arrived on the scene by the time that I was able to give the dispatcher the information. If the MVA had happened in CT, CT State Police would take a minimum of 30 minutes to respond. If there were injuries, they would have to request mutual aid from MA municipality's ambulance service. Needless to say that these types of issues are the exception but at least with the landline, we can get to the agency that we need without much delay.

If you have internet, some cell phone providers provide wifi calling, which makes your wifi router act as a local cell access point. This works excellent for us, and even works when we are in Japan and connected to a wifi access point, just as if we were in the US.

Without this feature, we would not have considered cutting the landline service.

Pretty sure you can give your home address as what is to be used if you call 911 with your cell phone.

Just a couple thoughts that made my decision to cut the landline easier.

 

[Jchonline]

Just a quick question.

I am getting a bit aggravated by my total internet package cost.

It just seems excessive for what you get.

I am thinking of dumping my landline and just using WiFi cell phone as my normal phone. All we get anyway over the landline is robo calls anyway.

Appreciate any pointers as to the good or bad of doing this.

If you are nervous about giving up that number, you can port it to Google Voice, the put the app on your phone and it will ring on your phone. I think it was $20 to port the number.

If you dont mind giving up your number then what are you waiting for! Do it.

 

[Jchonline]

If I dumped our landlines (2), we would be without the ability to call police or fire departments. The closes cell tower is in the next state about 4 miles away, and service is horrible once the leaves are on the trees. Winter isn't too bad, but even then, if you need to call for assistance on 911, you don't know who is going to pick up the call, since that tower directs 911 calls to both MA and CT operators. Had that happen last year when I called 911 to report a MVA (motor vehicle accident) that happened in MA near the CT border. The call went to the CT911 operator, who had to redirect it to the MA911 operator, who then redirected it to the MA State Police, who then forwarded it to the correct municipality for a response. By then someone else had notified the municipality PD and they arrived on the scene by the time that I was able to give the dispatcher the information. If the MVA had happened in CT, CT State Police would take a minimum of 30 minutes to respond. If there were injuries, they would have to request mutual aid from MA municipality's ambulance service. Needless to say that these types of issues are the exception but at least with the landline, we can get to the agency that we need without much delay.

You can also setup e911 info on your cell phone (most of them anyway) so it uses that info as your location. Even my Arlo cameras have e911 built in now...I can hit the emergency button in the app on my phone (cell or wifi connected) and it will call 911 with that info.

 

[Henro]

Decided today to cut the umbilical cord.

Ended up saving about $60 per month, but that included about $16 off for returning 2 extra set top boxes that we are not using.

Also got $10 per month off for using a debit card rather than a credit card, and a $5 per month military vets discount. So net result was the phone was costing around $28 per month. Still worth something, but the total savings ended up being much better than just cutting the phone service, due to unneeded equipment return, and the debit card and vet discounts.

Most important thing learned: If you are a vet, do not forget to ask about veteran's discounts. Lowes gives a pretty good one at I think 10% off for non sale items.

 

[WFM]

I have a land line for my business but will be getting rid of cabe TV soon..
My property taxes and my Spectrum bill a year are the same. Does that make any sense. I'll be keeping my phone and internet and kicking cable. A ruko tv is $200. hook it to the interent and have hundreds of free channels. I downloaded MotorTrend channel for $35. a year and my girlfriend bought Paramount for $70. a year. I bought a TV antenna for $20. bucks on Amazon and get NBC and ABC crystal clear. CBS is on Paramount. She also bought a firestick for another TV. Again hundreds of channels. She bought Discovery+ $7. a month no commericals. And again hundreds of channels. I'll be saving $1300. a year by getting rid of cable.

 

[Old_Paint]

Unfortunately, my LL, internet, and TV are a bundled UVerse package. If I touch one of them, I lose what's left of any discounts I get on the other two. UVerse is getting STOOPID expensive while the internet fee and phone are less than a 3rd of the bill. If I drop the LL, the UVerse costs go up even more. Time to give 'em a call and tell 'em to sharpen their pencils. Sometimes, ya just gotta remind the greedy ba$tards that there are alternatives. I knocked about $100/month off my bill last year by telling them why I prefer AT&T over other services. Need to make that call again. They'll work with you, for a year, then you gotta remind them again that you have options.

 

[mikester]

We did it two years ago and haven’t looked back. The only pain is updating your primary phone number to your cell with banks, credit cards, etc.

We did it 10 years ago. Just ported the LL number over to the new cell provider for free before switching. No fuss. My biggest concern was cellular dead zones.

We live in the country so there's no other services to bundle. My neighbour finally got kicked off the party line and was forced to upgrade his dial phone. He was the only one on the party line!

 

[fried1765]

Decided today to cut the umbilical cord.

Ended up saving about $60 per month, but that included about $16 off for returning 2 extra set top boxes that we are not using.

Also got $10 per month off for using a debit card rather than a credit card, and a $5 per month military vets discount. So net result was the phone was costing around $28 per month. Still worth something, but the total savings ended up being much better than just cutting the phone service, due to unneeded equipment return, and the debit card and vet discounts.

Most important thing learned: If you are a vet, do not forget to ask about veteran's discounts. Lowes gives a pretty good one at I think 10% off for non sale items.

Home Depot gives the same 10% vet discount, up to a total of $400 per year.
I do not believe that Lowes has a yearly maximum.
Lowes is MUCH easier to use also,....with after initial sign up, just giving cashier your phone number.

 

[lugbolt]

I keep the landline. I ran a line out to the shop. The cellphone doesn't work IN the shop (when the doors are down) and I'm in the shop quite often working on whatever. So when people try to call it goes straight to voicemail and I never know unless I go outside then I get texts and voicemails just fine. But the landline, no problem to call. And-the GF can call me from her cellphone while she's sitting in the house, and I can get the call on the landline.

So I keep the landline. It's $10/mo added to internet bill, so no big deal.

 

[Biker1mike]

We still have landline. On a good day we can get 1 bar of cell service in the yard. Put leaves on the trees and it is 0 bars. Just got high speed internet last year but they do not offer phone yet.
We are the house that the truckers walk to when they get stuck on the hill in the ice/snow !
I tried a cell amplifier but you need a signal for that to work.
It is kind of fun to watch the city summer folks on the side of the road walking in circles with the cell phone held high trying to hit a tower. If they do not pull an attitude we let use the land line.
The phone in the machine shed is a rotary with a 10 foot cord.

 

[Goz63]

Just a quick question.

I am getting a bit aggravated by my total internet package cost.

It just seems excessive for what you get.

I am thinking of dumping my landline and just using WiFi cell phone as my normal phone. All we get anyway over the landline is robo calls anyway.

Appreciate any pointers as to the good or bad of doing this.

If you have good cell service or good internet you really gain nothing from a landline. We haven’t had one since 2012. Never missed it.

 

[Henro]

We still have landline. On a good day we can get 1 bar of cell service in the yard. Put leaves on the trees and it is 0 bars. Just got high speed internet last year but they do not offer phone yet.
We are the house that the truckers walk to when they get stuck on the hill in the ice/snow !
I tried a cell amplifier but you need a signal for that to work.
It is kind of fun to watch the city summer folks on the side of the road walking in circles with the cell phone held high trying to hit a tower. If they do not pull an attitude we let use the land line.
The phone in the machine shed is a rotary with a 10 foot cord.

Our cell signal is very poor with ATT. If it were verizon it would be five bars.

BUT ATT offers what they call something like WIFI calling. What this does is let your phone connect to through the internet just like it was connecting to a cell tower. Perfect signal strength both ways all the time. Of course, you need a wifi access point in your home. But most people have this today, I think.

Works for us, and has for a few years. Before that, we had a device supplied by ATT that plugged into our router with an either net cable, which caused the same thing to happen.

Ask you cell service provider if they offer WIFI calling. If they do, it will match the performance of your land line, in our experience anyway...

Edit: of course, you need cell phones that can access WIFI. Would not work with an older flip phone I guess...

 

[Biker1mike]

Our cell signal is very poor with ATT. If it were verizon it would be five bars.

BUT ATT offers what they call something like WIFI calling. What this does is let your phone connect to through the internet just like it was connecting to a cell tower. Perfect signal strength both ways all the time. Of course, you need a wifi access point in your home. But most people have this today, I think.

Works for us, and has for a few years. Before that, we had a device supplied by ATT that plugged into our router with an either net cable, which caused the same thing to happen.

Ask you cell service provider if they offer WIFI calling. If they do, it will match the performance of your land line, in our experience anyway...

Edit: of course, you need cell phones that can access WIFI. Would not work with an older flip phone I guess...

Our internet is supplied by the local phone company. They are working on getting the phone end installed.
We can wait for them.
Since I retired my cell usage is about 95% WAZE

 

[Henro]

Our internet is supplied by the local phone company. They are working on getting the phone end installed.
We can wait for them.
Since I retired my cell usage is about 95% WAZE

I think the point I was trying to make is with an internet router that provides WIFI, you do not need the local phone line if your cell provider offers WIFI connectivity.

Never heard of WAZE but google proved to be my friend again.