I’ve been thinking about ditching my land line and just using my cell phone for a while now, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it with my old service. Last weekend I changed carriers and got a cool new phone, and over the past week I’ve made some test long-distance and local calls from my living room couch: each time, I talked for over an hour with no static or other problems, so I realized it was finally time to drop my home phone service.
What surprised me is that it took nearly a week for me to finally make the calls! Even though I hardly ever used the home phone, I’d just always had one and it took a few days for logic and rational thought to overcome psychology. Which isn’t like me: usually, once I realize that something is clearly the right choice, I don’t hesitate. So it was weird to find myself hesitating about cancelling the land line. But now it’s done! I’m going to make my cell plan more robust by doubling my minutes and adding a text messaging package, and I’ll still save at least $50/month.
Plus, I just downloaded AC/DC’s “Back In Black” as my ringtone. I’m psyched.
I love having mobile only. When I moved back from NY to PA, I just never got land line service again. Sure, I suppose there is a land line in my house because I do have DSL, but I couldn’t tell you what the number to it is and there’s no phone attached.
It’s a wonderful thing to only have one phone number and to always be able to make a call from it or get a call at it, and my phone bills are so much lower now. No more paying out my ass to have a telephone that just sits there.
I want to do this, but cell signal strength is a bit sketchy at our house. Until we feel more confident with the service, we’ll continue to pay for the land line. That’s what we get for living in the boonies, I guess.
If you’ve got the land, you could lease to the Mobile carrier to raise a tower. You’d be surprised at how much they might be willing to pay you if it’s a strategic location.
The only person to raise a concern so far has been my mother, who wondered what I’d do in an emergency if there was no power and/or my cell phone wasn’t working but I needed to make a call. I told her that I could always use a neighbor’s phone, or drive to my office (which is all of 3 miles away) – assuming, of course, that whatever catastrophe knocked out the power and cell phone service is only affecting my house. She seemed satisfied with my answer.
I have risen above even such petty connections: I’ve had a cable modem for the past two years.
When I was thinking all of this through, the only reason I could come up with to have an active phone connection would be if I were ever to get TiVo – but then I figured that if I ever did get it, I’d probably just set it up so that it could update wirelessly via the internet.
I’m not in the boonies, but that’s what kept me from doing it with my old carrier; I think it was a combination of so-so service and a decent-but-not-great phone. I’m still a renter, so now I just have to hope that when I move again I can afford another place with decent cell reception!
We ditched our landline about 6 months ago or so. With 4 cell phones in the house, it just didn’t make sense to keep it on. Only telemarketers called it. We stopped answering it.
We still have DSL, which according to people I talk to is not supposed to be possible, but here I sit, online, via DSL.
I’m going to make my cell plan more robust by doubling my minutes and adding a text messaging package, and I’ll still save at least $50/month.
She seemed satisfied with my answer.