When I was kid, if the phone rang you answered it.
Last Sunday I realized that of the dozen or so calls we got, only one was a personal call. The others: (1) 3 calls from NCO financial, a collection agency, trying to collect a debt from the person who had our phone number before we did (over 6 years ago) (2) 2 calls from one non-profit looking for clothing donations (3) 1 call from the Police association looking for cash donations (4) 1 call from the notorious auto-warranty (yours has just expired) folks, plus at least 3 other calls with no or bogus caller ID who didn’t leave messages.
I thought with the no-call lists we could start enjoying having a phone again, but now its gone back to being primarily an annoyance.
Anyone gotten around this with any hi-tech phone features, or do you just pull the pin and live off cell phones?
I refuse to only have a cell phone because for some things they have to have a phone # and then I’ll start getting crap calls on my cell.
We screen our calls. We don’t answer the phone if the number is one we don’t recognize. We let them leave a message and will call back. We are at about 5% calls we care about, or less.
The ones I hate are the calls you pick up and only get the clicks on the other end. Occasionally I’m waiting for a call and pick up one of those and I have it. I’ve started telling them to fuck off.
Your sampling, is pretty much dead on, except that one personal call. I don’t even get those.
However, I do keep one active for 2 reasons:
Emergency use. I have kids in the house, and I always want them to have a phone to use in case of emergencies. Their cell phones are frequently misplaced or not charged.
I would have already moved to an internet based house phone, except that I don’t have cable TV. So, my internet is on DSL, and it always works out to be more expensive to make the switch. This doesn’t really solve anything w/ the trash calls, but another factor to consider in the traditional “home phone”.
Emergencies is why I keep mine too. We tried VOIP but since our internet isn’t reliable, it wasn’t either and it defeated the purpose of the emergency access.
I will also use is for work related conference calls because my cell reception isn’t perfect at home.
I refuse to only have a cell phone because for some things they have to have a phone # and then I’ll start getting crap calls on my cell.
FYI…I’ve been cell phone only for approx. 5 years now and haven’t any the situation where I “needed” a landline phone #. I also haven’t had any spam calls on my cell either.
Land lines are going the way of the dinosaurs. They cost too much money for companies vs cell phones. The only reason we have a land line is for our alarm. Last time I heard the alarm companies were looking into ways to use the internet and or cell phones as a replacement for the land line. Once that happens our land line is history.
We are the same way. Both the wife and I have cell phones - the landline is kept mainly for the house alarm. Once that is able to be done over something else, we’ll be switching and getting rid of it. We are already semi-VoIP - we have our phone service over our cable (Rogers Home Phone in Ontario), but it’s not real VoIP - and, while cheaper than the telco, is still a bit pricey.
I refuse to only have a cell phone because for some things they have to have a phone # and then I’ll start getting crap calls on my cell.
FYI…I’ve been cell phone only for approx. 5 years now and haven’t any the situation where I “needed” a landline phone #. I also haven’t had any spam calls on my cell either.
My mother in law wanted us to get a land line because she thought that when she called my wife cell phone she didn’t answer was because the cell service was unreliable, which wasn’t the case. I told her in a tactful way that if she wanted us to get a land line for no other reason for my wife to ignore calls when she made the phone blow up then she was obligated to pay for it. Conversation turned to things she didn’t have to pay for.
Our landline was a target for everything except phone calls we wanted I never answered it and my wife maybe answered it once every 100 rings
I have been seriously considering this for quite some time. I too only get calls from sales people etc. I used to think I needed to keep it because I have directv. However, all my receivers are pretty new and I am pretty sure I don’t really need it for that either. Not sure why I haven’t pulled the plug yet. Guess I need to put that on my to do list.
With Direct TV they want you to have it for movies on demand but you can just log into your account online if you want to watch a PPV movie.
I’ve been with out home phone for 8 years operating only on my mobile. I don’t miss a $25-$40 bill every month so that some sales person that I don’t want to talk to can call me.
We were with out a land line (well me first) for about a decade and recently installed a new one because my wife was frustrated by dropped calls in the house. Since the time we had the line installed I’m out about $75-$100 for approx 30min worth of use. She still has to have it though.
BTW my mother in law was over joyed when we got the land line because she (for 7 years) couldn’t figure out how we got on without one. In the past four months we have had the home phone she has called it exactly zero times. Go figure.
We have a landline. It’s the first for me since 2002. Four months in we get close to 0 solicitations and service is good. It’s through the cable/internet company so I think that it’s VOIP. Cell service in our town in pretty lousy - likely due to hilly terrain, lots of rock and the ocean. I have a BlackBerry through work. If I’m on the phone outside of work hours, it’s a 30min long-distance call or a 10s meet-me-here call. Call display, audible name display and an unlisted number are working well so far.
