Slate says that growth of wireless phone customers in America combined with a bad economy has helped initiate an historic shift in how we think about landlines—specifically, they’re no longer considered an essential utility by a large portion of the population:
But in this first real slowdown of the wireless age, consumers seem to be saying that home-based telephones are expendable luxuries, like Starbucks lattes or Coach handbags. And it makes sense. Confronted with high inflation, soaring energy costs, and stagnant wages, millions of households are facing choices about which monthly bills to pay and which commitments to maintain. And if it comes down to one or the other, the mobile or the home-based land line, it’s clear which is a necessity and which is an option.
It’s not just tight budgets, though. Slate speculates that foreclosures are also having an effect, because as people move into rentals or in with relatives, they shut off existing landlines and don’t bother reconnecting.
I haven’t had a traditional landline since 2002. At first I moved to Vonage, then a DIY SIP setup that I never could get working correctly. Finally I realized it was both cheaper and simpler to just forego a home line entirely.
“Phones Without Homes” [Slate] (Thanks to SpiderJerusalem!)
(Photo: Getty)
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Since I got a Tmobile phone with UMA (a wifi radio in the phone that connects to wireless routers and lets me call over the net) I’ve found that if you have naked/dry loop DSL or cable internet with a wireless router, poor cell service at your house is no longer an issue. The phone figures out what has the strongest signal (wifi or cell tower) and connects to that. I’ve really found it to be useful. No more dropped calls in my basement, and when I’m at my friends house in his basement, I have full service while he has to put his phone in the window well and use bluetooth. Tmo only has a couple of phones that do this though…
I disconnected my landline in February after buying a new cell phone (my old one was so old it was practically a rotary cell phone). The AT&T guy kept telling me I needed it for satellite or DVR, and I don’t have either. I was paying close to $50 a month for a basic landline, and he offered me a $10 special but I just didn’t feel like it after he had been such an aggressive ass and told me if I had kids “They’re trained to dial 911 on landlines.” Yeah, right.
At some point I might be able to afford Tivo or DVR, so if I really do need a landline for those, I’m screwed. Anyone know a way around that? Or was the dude just full of crap?
@temporaryerror: also, my phone is an excellent way to very quickly find unsecured/free hotspots trying to find a connection for my laptop.
@lalaland13: most newer/ish TiVo’s have a ethernet port. You can connect it through that rather than the phone line, plus you get some sort of additional TiVo content. You can also buy a wireless adapter for TiVos
I moved in 2004 to DC, and never hooked up a landline. I don’t miss it, even though I have crappy reception at my apartment
@IphtashuFitz: To my knowledge, they are not supposed to, FCC regulations are supposed to be such that any phone can dial 911. I think that even if you don’t have a dial tone, it can still tell if you’re trying to dial 911.
(Disclaimer, I work for a company that does locations for two of the major cell phone providers in the US)
As for 911 with cell phones, it shouldn’t be giving a “ball park” location. It should be pretty accurate. Granted, it’s not going to tell you what room of the building you are in, but a properly set up system can get you really darn close. There’s two primary means of locating a person – network and handset based. Network based solutions have the advantage of working indoors and other conditions in which you don’t have a line of site to a satellite, but the drawback is that you need a good amount of towers around, which usually isn’t available in rural areas. Handset based solutions can be extremely accurate — provided you’re not inside or don’t have a good line of site to a satellite (i.e. dense urban areas). New FCC regulations are more strict which will probably mean hybrid solutions to get the best of both worlds.
I live in a 12 unit condo building in Chicago. Most of the owners are under 35. I was looking at the AT&T connection box and there is only one unit that has a traditional wired phone line. That is 1 out of 12.
FYI, I have “naked” DSL (no phone line) and a cell phone and have no need for anything else. FYI 2, I love Skype.
@temporaryerror: Sweet, thanks for the info. I actually don’t hate my cable company too much (it’s not Comcast, thank God) so a DVR/Tivo might be an option sometime in the future.
And I’ll add my voice to the chorus that said all my landline was good for was getting harassed by telemarketers. Although I did have one guy who kept calling me because he thought I had a tractor repair shop.
@tomcatv1: And they were supposed to be. In national emergencies, the government seizes control of the local telephone networks. Cellular and wireline. Emergency telecom shares the same infrastructure with everyone else. They kick you off so that they can get about the business of fixing what has gone wrong. When they finish up, they return the service to you.
No landline for us – only cell phones. Although I really overspend on cable, so the net dollar gain is about zero.
In the 3+ years we’ve had this setup, the only inconvenience (never had cause to call 911) has been that our building access was only tied to standard landlines, which meant that a guest/delivery person had to call one of our phones so we could go to the entrance and let them in. Not a big deal. When we moved in they told us that they were working on connecting the system to cell phones, and we sort of nodded and smiled – the tenants are mostly older folks, so we thought it would never happen. Imagine our suprise when it finally did! Now we don’t have to get off our lazy butts to actually walk anywhere!
count me as “cell only”. i’m home more now than i used to be, but my home phone goes with me, plus i have the added bonus of not receiving telemarketing calls (one or two/year & the second i say it’s a cell, they say sorry & hang up).
i’ve used 911 on both verizon & at&t in spotty coverage areas & it works ok. if it were a life/death emergency, i’d be dead (transferring to the proper dispatch takes ~5 minutes), but luckily it was just minor issues.
@lalaland13: Yep, I’ve experienced the exact same tactics by people selling landlines. The phone companies must be getting desperate if they think that lies and fearmongering are the best way to sell their product. I believe it was an Embarq sales guy that gave me the exact same line you describe. I told him I didn’t appreciate his lying and hung up.
Back at the beginning of the year there was a jail break from the county jail. About a half-dozen prisoners got out.
The county, using reverse 911, notified all residents living within 1 mile of the jail of the jail break. ONLY land-lines are called.
There is an industrial plant in the next county over, makes some sort of plastics from oil. There was a chlorine leak. The county, using reverse 911, notified all residents living within 1 miles of the plant about the chlorine leak. ONLY land-lines are called.
Would you like for me to continue?
Yep, you darn right I have a land line.
@bonzombiekitty: @GrandizerGo: Good to know, thanks! Not surprisingly, at first glance there’s not a whole lot of information on AT&T’s site for unbundled DSL.
Two of our friends who lived across the street from the WTC had Voicestream/Tmobile during 9/11. They were able to make and receive calls from family in Dallas during that day. During hurricane warnings, the govt does block landline access before the storm arrives. I’ve run into that with hurricanes Rita and Andrew.
If I was living in apartments, I wouldn’t get a landline either. Easier to just keep a cell and use cable internet. Especially if you move around to get the move-in specials.
@GrandizerGo: I think I pay 5 bucks a month more for my dry loop DSL than I would if I had a landline too. Certainly not worth it to have the landline.
On another mildly amusing note, my entire connection is coax right up to the last 6 inches between the demark and the DSL modem.
@Ragman:
Since when does the gov block land lines during storms?
Katrina victim here. My sis evacuated to Houston and I was on the phone with her up to about an hour before the eye of Katrina hit. Land-line to land-line. Cell phones were dead of course because they don’t work well when microwave towers are destroyed.
I still have a landline.. put it in vacation mode about 4 years ago…Cost me $.07 a month, for a buck a year im guaranteed 911 if there’s ever a need. Never used it, so why pay.. I always have my cell phone, and that’s how people called me before anyways.
We use Vonage for our “land line” because we call Europe a lot and we’ve got unlimited minutes for $300/year. If we didn’t need it for that, we’d probably just stick with our cell phones. We could use the cell for calls to Europe, but it costs more.
We use Vonage as well, for a little bit more than $5 a month in savings, plus being able to call 1 county over for free (hellsouth used to charge 25-40cents a call). My wife works over-nights and sleeps during the day. I like the security of knowing that if she hears something go bump in the day, she can just pick up the phone and call for help… how many of you keep your cellphone with your wallet and keys in a tray by the front door???
@ Nighthawke:
“Landlines are a subsidized line item that the FCC and state pay for, so there are laws in place ordering the telecoms to maintain them.”
Um, no they are not subsidized. In fact, landlines are GOLD to the phone company and to your State and local governments. They cost almost nothing to provide (as a technical matter), are regulated and highly taxed. They are, however, offered on a common carrier basis so that sometimes the cost of providing service to a single home/business is done below “marginal” cost. But overall, these are not subsidized services. Rather the opposite (VONAGE/VOIP are ‘subsidized’ in the sense that they are free riding on top of another network (the Internet)).
How many of those surveyed were teenagers and college kids whose parents pay their bills and have no more pressing need of a phone than to order pizzas and find out which one of their neckbearded friends is bringing the skull bong that night?
Even the most “luxurious” land line package out there is still less than half as much as a cell phone plan and your 911 calls don’t get routed to some central dispatch office for the entire state that takes 15 minutes just to connect you to a local operator.
My house is a dead zone for wireless so we have landlines.
I also have a black rotary phone on my desk! It’s awesome and still works great.
I was trying to get rid of the landline but since I dont have cable It wasnt worth it to get dry loop dsl. The trick at least with at&t is to ask for their unmetreed plan which is $5/month, $12 with all the stupid taxes. It worked out just a couple of bucks more than having dry loop but at least I still have a real phone number for 911 or if there is a power outage and cell phones don’t work (which has happened in an emergency).
I then have packet8 VOIP and a cell phone on prepay. VOIP is abotu $24 with free calls anywhere in US and most of Europe with call waiting, voicemail and all those other features people pay extra for with normal telcos. I dont have any normal phone connected to the landline, just the modem/router so never have a problem with telemarketing calls.
@Corporate-Shill: I need a cell phone anyway, and I don’t want to pay for a landline additionally. I’m not going to pay for one just for exceptional situations. The solution to the problems you describe is for government to get off their butts and adapt with the times by making all these services work with cell phones too.
I’d still love someone to outline a dry-loop DSL strategy with Verizon in
Washington State. Like I said, every time I’ve talked to them about it,
they’ve told me it’s simply not available in this state. I know it’s
available for more fortunate people with AT&T, but I don’t have that. And
I’m sure as hell not giving Comcast any of my money.
Needless-to-say, I only have a landline because I need broadband internet
and it’s the only non-Comcast way to get it.
@LouiseDeion: Dunno why they don’t offer it. Verizon in the Philadelphia area offers it.
@Fly Girl: I also had the “$10″ a month home phone service just so I could have DSL. The expense when you have a phone that cheap is all the taxes and fees! I was paying nearly $10/mo in taxes etc too, making my bill nearly $20 for measured rate service that I NEVER used.
I have a landline now because it came with the cable/internet package from Time Warner. Both my roommate and I are amazed at how many times a day our phone rings, considering neither of us have our number memorized therefore have NEVER even so much as given it to anyone.
Landlines are for telemarketers.
@Nighthawke:
“The other thing is the landline service is a state- and federally guaranteed service, cell service is NOT. If a storm wipes out both services at once, which will take priority? The landlines of course. If both services break, which take precidence? The landlines again. Telecoms don’t want to get nailed for neglecting their copper lines for they can and will get nailed for it.
Landlines are a subsidized line item that the FCC and state pay for, so there are laws in place ordering the telecoms to maintain them. “
Try living in Ameritech who later became SBC who later became AT&T this. Our land line was out more often than our cell phone, internet, power, and water combined. $40 a month for just basic phone service, no long distance. I pay $60 for two cell phones with unlimited long distance. So when we moved I qualified for the bundle cable package for an extra $20 I get home phone service and free long distance. Either way a cell phone or IPphone is cheaper than a land line and gives better service.
@khiltd:
“Even the most “luxurious” land line package out there is still less than half as much as a cell phone plan and your 911 calls don’t get routed to some central dispatch office for the entire state that takes 15 minutes just to connect you to a local operator. “
Not here, plan old basic phone is $40 before taxes making it about $45 or so. I pay $60 for two cell phones so that makes $30/phone and the cell phones have free long distance, the land line I have to pay for long distance.
To those asking about land lines more costly than cell phones? My cell phone is more, but with all taxes, sur-charges, et. al. it gets closer. And if you need to drop your telecom costs, the land line can go.
I have Vonage for my business (phone+fax =~ $60/mo) and Verizon calls every now and again to get me back. They can’t even offer 1 line for that price, so I should switch back why???
Let’s face it, between a cell phone and internet via wi-fi or TV cable, who needs a land line anymore? There might be a large number of people who will continue to use them, but it’s not 99% of the population anymore.
The last time I had a land line was when I had to live in another city for a few months to do a job. I only got the land line so I could use dialup internet – a local cable company wanted a two year contract, the phone and dialup was month to month payment. I went for the phone solely because it was easier to get out of.
I only have a land line, and its a hell of alot cheaper than two cell phones a month, specially ones we dont use. I am thinking of getting prepaid, for emergencies.
There are still large populated areas with poor or nonexistent cellphone service. For example, no cellphones work at my house, though they work about a block away. This means that for many of my patients, a cellphone is NOT a safe or useful substitute for a landline.
Seems silly to compare sub-$15/month landline services with basic cellphone services. For $15/month I can get a landline tied to a single location with no ability to call non-local numbers. For $35/month I can get a basic cellphone plan tied to the continental U.S. with CallerID, VM, free long distance, and more minutes than I can use in a month. To get the equivalent services on a landline, it would cost considerably more than $35/month.
I have 4 cell-phones (one for each family member) on a shared plan, Skype VOIP (unlimited calls to all the U.S. and Canada, all the extra services like VM and CallerID), and GrandCentral for switchboarding, all for $79/month.
I had the opportunity to tour my city’s 911 dispatch center.
Their suggestions:
1. Program the local emergency number for a faster response into your cellphone.
2. If you have VoIP, make sure you keep your physical address information up-to-date. With number portability, your number may be routed to a 911 center based on the area code of your number. This is bad if you have moved.
3. Be prepared to verify your location. This is one of the first questions they will ask. Bottom line: They can’t send help if they don’t know where you are.
I have my land line. The last time there was an minor earthquake, no one could get in touch with me on my cell (based on the time-stamped voicemails) and for a few hours all I could get was “your call cannot be completely at this time.” The land line still worked and I was able to receive calls and call out.
Wish I could give up the land line, but due to my extremely desolate & remote location (30 miles from Manhattan), I’m lucky to get any kind of cell phone signal. Plus who would my ex’s creditors call if I cut the home phone off? I get a clearer connection from my boss traveling in India than I do calling across town.
Our landline would go in a heartbeat except for the costs related to overseas calls. If my wonderful M-i-L lived in US it wouldnt be necessary to keep it, but as she lives in the UK our landline is the cheapest way to go.
I’ve got a landline, only costs $15/month. I keep it because I’ve got kids and if I ever have dial 911 they’ll know exactly where my house is. My son also plays a few online games and will tie the line up for hours with his friend; since it’s a local call there’s no extra charge for the calls.
I do have a cell phone; it’s used mostly to call my wife.
once cell phones came out I never understood the point of land line except 911. You never know who the call is for, the thing gets lost like a remote, and it either never used (hence a waste) or hogged by one family member (hence they need to get their own phone and pay for it). Also if you arent home (which is most of the day) its useless.
I am going through this very debate right now.
MCI just sent me my new bill, which they so kindly raised my monthly price on, so now after taxes my home land line is over $60/month. I do have caller id, and voice mail, long distance and call waiting. Time to start shopping around. I kinda need it for at least another 2 years a which point my contract with Brinks is up and I can cancel the monitoring service, but I also have DirecTV and need the phone line hooked up to it also
@Corporate-Shill: If you called out from NO, it wouldn’t matter. Calling into the area is spotty, and around the time it hits, that’s when they’ll block the incoming calls, so emergency calls within the area can be made.
In 9/11, Verizon service was hampered because Verizon had a switching office by the WTC, and had 10 cell towers that connected through their WTC office.
@oregongal: I recently kicked the land line habit and have no intention of going back. My cell works for all the domestic calls. I have quite a number of people I keep in contact with outside of the country – Skype or Skype Out work great for those. Even if you’re calling a cell phone or land line overseas, it costs next to nothing – computer-to-computer of course is free and has been reliable for me regardless of whether it’s Europe, India or Australia. Might be just the ticket for your M i L. You can get Skype In too if it doesn’t work for her to call you on a cell.
This makes no sense.
Landlines are too expensive, so me, my wife, and my 3 kids all have cellphones for the low, low price of $400/mo!
There’s a conversation on another post about Subway and cellphone usage there and how they’re nothing short of heroic for telling people to get off the phone. Are we really at such a point where we need to be on the phone all damn day? Maybe instead of complaining about $20-30/mo phone bills we should ask why the smallest cellphone plans are 450 minutes instead of 100 or something that would be more conducive to people who aren’t constantly yakking into the damn things.
@Colage:
Yes, it makes sense. A basic land line here is $40 and you get poor service. I pay $60 for two cell phones and get free long distance so cell service is $10 cheaper per “line”, has better relaibility and more features.
Hmmm…. I wonder…. has anyone read that recent news article that says don’t use cell phones they may give you cancer?
Anyway, here’s what it comes down to.
Cell phones give you portability and accesibility. People like that.
The trade-offs however are numerous.
You can’t lose your landline telephone.
You are far less likely to break your landline telephone by sitting on it, dropping it in the sink, etc.
You don’t need to replace the phone every 18 months, or the applicable accesories that you “need to have” such as charger, headsets etc etc
Cell phones are far more likely to go down in an emergency as they systems can get overloaded. 9/11 anyone?
You can have multiple people on a landline call since you probably have more then one phone. not so with a cell phone.
You can’t send a fax from a cell phone.
Most of the time you can’t run an alarm circuit thru a cell phone.
You don’t have to worry about dead batteries.
Reception issues? What reception issues?
People act like “OMG! It’s SO much $$$!” What most people do not realize is that if you have cable & internet, you can can bundle a landline with free LD for about $20-30. Basic cable is typically $40/50. Dry loop DSL is about $40. You can get that + free LD for $110 including taxes/fees in NJ. So really, it’s not much more money then just having the cable and internet.
Most local telcos do not have a contract for their phone service. You are free to cancel/switch providers at any time. With a cell phone, the ETF can be nasty.
Now you can always get local service thru VOIP (Vonage) or cable. However many of these same issues still exist. what that tells me is that people are willing to accept the limitations and liabilities of cell phones because they value the portability more. Everyone has their reasons.
I really don’t like always being available. I’m only 32, but I act like a dinosaur in that regard. I also wear a watch, crazy I know. I have a pre-paid cellphone, 1000 min/1-yr T-Mobile plan for me and the wife = $200. Then I have Vonage. Total telephone expenses a year $568.04. Still feel its way too high, but haven’t found a way to make it any lower yet