how many of you discontinued your home phone service...

[Dancing Fire]

since you own a cell phone?

 

[zoebartlett]

Technically we still have a land line because it came as a bundle with our cable and Internet package. We've never used it though since we only use our cell phones (we don't even know the #).

 

[honey22]

Yep! I hate Telstra. I didn't want to pay $20 for land line rental when we both have massive caps on our mobiles.

 

[PinkTower]

Technically we still have a land line because it came as a bundle with our cable and Internet package. We've never used it though since we only use our cell phones (we don't even know the #).

We have ATT and it was no cheaper to skip the land line. I live in a hurricane prone area, so it is nice to have it as a backup, I guess.
I have our landline hooked up to a fax machine. I cannot figure out how to not have a land line if you need a fax machine.

 

[Rae~]

Technically we still have a land line because it came as a bundle with our cable and Internet package. We've never used it though since we only use our cell phones (we don't even know the #).

+1

 

[soocool]

No FIOS here, otherwise I would have gotten rid of my landline ages ago.

 

[kama_s]

I've never found the need for a landline. Yup, I'm one of *those* people! Both hubby and I have cell phones, and they are plenty.

 

[NewEnglandLady]

I'm the opposite--I'd give up my cell phone before cutting the cord. If anybody calls my cell at home, I call them back on my landline.

 

[hihowareyou]

We have VOIP with our ADSL connection which suits us well and the calls are mostly free or very cheap. Not having to pay line rental is wonderful! I hardly use my mobile phone for making calls so just use prepaid credit and spend about $50-80 on it a year.

I kind of desperately want to get a smart phone so this may change soon. For us both to have smart phones with decent-ish caps would be about $1000/year more than we currently pay so I'm hesitant.

 

[Nashville]

No way, I actually love using my landline and despise cell phones.

Why? Because if someone calls me at home and I am there to answer, chances are I have time to talk with them and am not in the car, grocery shopping, at a doctor's appointment or otherwise out and busy. I have a cell phone for emergencies but most people know I rarely (if ever) answer it or talk on it.

It became like having a tracking device on me and people always asking why I didn't answer my cell phone (as if there should be an excuse). Forget that noise!

 

[Fly Girl]

We have a low limit family plan on our cell phones, so we keep the land line. I give out the land phone number to people all the time so that we can talk on it and not use the cell phone minutes. This keeps all the solitation calls on that phone as well. We have dropped long distance on the land line, and use our cells for those calls. The land line costs us $17 per month, and is definitely worth it to me. Also, the various "toll-free" numbers are actually toll-free only on the land line.

 

[CurlySue]

Haven't had a land line since 2005.

 

[monarch64]

What's a land line?

 

[elrohwen]

Me. I only got it the first year of my cable plan because it came as part of the package. Now that the discount is gone, I ditched it. I never used it once while I had it.

Actually, while I had it at my first apartment, I got constant calls from creditors for some random lady and it was a huge pain. I couldn't wait to cancel that phone! No matter how many times I told them that I didn't know Gail Whats-her-face they would not leave me alone.

 

[MichelleCarmen]

We had one for about five months when we needed to regularily use our fax machine. That's the only time in probably six years we had one.

 

[partgypsy]

I like a landline better than a phone. My husband and I have cellphones but they are prepaid so we just try to use them minimally. We probably could save a bit of money by going all cell, but I'm just not comfortable with that yet.

 

[lucyandroger]

We have a landline because it came with our bundle. My parents and wrong numbers are the only ones that call it.

 

[movie zombie]

we maintain a landline for local phone use but primarily its emergency related:
1-cell towers in our area may go down or not be working while landlines stay working
2-911 calls can be more easily linked to locations
3-reverse 911 calls [had one in which an armed felon was in the area and being searched for in our area of the mountains].

MoZo

 

[meresal]

We actually didn't have one, and just added one.

We needed it for our alarm system... and I'm glad we have it now, b/c our cell service sucks in our house.

 

[DivaDiamond007]

When we bought our first house last year I priced it out and it was actually cheaper to get the cable/internet/phone bundle than it was to get the cable and internet a la carte. DH and I both have smart phones with high caps so we usually use those. The only two people that call our landline are MIL and SIL.

Another consideration for us is the fact that in our area a 911 call from a cell can't be traced to your exact location. We have a toddler (and one on the way) so we feel safer having cells and a landline in case of an emergency.

 

[Brown.Eyed.Girl]

No landline for me, but my parents still have one. They tried not having one but my mom got too worried (what if something happened to her cell phone??) and they put it back in.

 

[Anonymous]

We got rid of ours when we moved to our new place in June. I sometimes miss it, but ALL of the calls we got were either wrong numbers, or people that we could talk to for "free" through our cell plan. Our kids are old enough to know how to use the cell phone and we're both good about having it accessible, plus we live in a populated area with good cell coverage. I still worry about emergencies, but there are other ways (teaching the kids how to use the phone, having it always charged and accessible, etc.) that make me feel comfortable giving up the added $35.00 a month land line.

 

[Dancing Fire]

What's a land line?

home phone line.

 

[reader]

Haven't had one in years. In fact, installing Verizon internet was a pain, as we had a hard wired rotary dialed phone in the kitchen I had to disconnect. (All my jacks were round too!)

 

[zoebartlett]

Cell service isn't the greatest at our house either, Meresal.

I suppose we'd save money by downgrading our shared cell phone plan and using the landline, but we haven't done that yet. We should think about that.

I actually do a lot of business-type calls on my way home from work (making appts., etc.), so I love having my cell phone for that. By the time I get home, I've usually accomplished a lot and I can relax a bit more. I also love not getting telemarketing (and other annoying) calls since we dropped a landline.

 

[ksinger]

Cell phones seem to be a perceived necessity these days, and that's all well and good. God knows I love mine and love what it offers in the way of security and being able to connect almost anywhere anytime. But we have given up more than many of the younger people here remember. Like reliable, unbreakable, CLEAR phone calls for one. I miss the old "pin drop" quality of phone calls. Of course I remember as a kid, hearing bleed-through on the lines too at times - someone else's conversation. It was weird...

I despise talking on a cellphone because you can just assume that you're going to be garbled or drop at some point. They are great for quickie stuff, but I'm not going to have a heart-to-heart with a girlfriend or distant uncle, with one.

So, I'm keeping my landline. When the lights are out, the hardwired landline works, and in this state, that's a GOOD thing.