We virtually never make LD calls using our land line. We’ve been 'using" AT&T for our long distance carrier simply because they didn’t have a monthly fee or minimum amount. (I don’t even have the foggiest idea what the per minute charge is – it’s pretty irrelevant when you never use it.) For the last few years our bill for long distance comes just the mandated 4 times a year, and says ‘amount due: zero.’
Today we got a postcard from AT&T saying that as of May1, 2006 there will be a $3.95 per month charge.
I’m not willing to pay AT&T nearly $50 a year for a service I don’t use.
What are the options? More specifically:
Can you drop long distance service entirely? As in, have NO carrier?
1a) If so, what happens if you actually try to dial an out of state number? Dead air? Or do they put the call through and sock you with some punitive rate?
1b) Would using one of those prepaid phone cards be possible/feasible, just in case you DID have to make a LD call during a power failure or something?
If you are required to have a designated LD supplier… I’ve done some googling and found that AmeriCom offers really low per minute rates and says NO monthly fees. Which sounds good, but I’ve never heard of the company before. Has anyone here had experience, good or bad, with them?
After getting slammed back and forth a few years ago, I called Qwest and asked them to block direct-dial LD on my line. IIRC, there was a small charge ($5.00?). But at that time and with that carrier, it was possible.
1a. I tried just after the change was confirmed, and got a recorded message that the call could not be completed as dialed.
1b. Prepaid cards work just fine. Ultimately, I signed up with a “10-10” carrier (Primus) for the few times I do make LD calls.
Of course, all this is subject to change depending on your carrier’s policies. But it shouldn’t hurt to ask.[ul]
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You’ll need to contact your local telephone company to see if you can remove LD service entirely.
Beware: Find out what “long distance” actually means to them, or you may suddenly be unable to make any “dial 1” calls out of your area code. If you’re in a state that’s only got one area code, no biggie, but that would be devastating in this area, where there are about eight area codes in a 50-mile radius of here.
All my years in college, we never had long distance service. We had local phone service, but no carrier for long distance. This worked great because when the bill came, we divided it evenly and didn’t have to worry about who made what long distance call when.
We could still call long distance with a calling card. Both the prepaid and the “credit card” types worked. One of my roommates used one of those 10-10 numbers (10-10-321?) and that worked, too. That charge came on our phone bill, but since she was the only one who used it, it wasn’t a problem when it came time to divide the bill.
This was only a couple of years ago.
I suppose it’s possible that this might not work everywhere, but it certainly worked fine for me.
