A few recent studies have indicated that more and more people are eliminating their home phone service in lieu of cell service. My mother has already done this (she’s such a rebel in her old age – she turns 67 this year). My father is considering it, and he’s 72, but it would mean going down to “naked” DSL and he’s not quite up on the concept yet. But both he and his wife have cell phones and almost always call me from them, rather than their house phone, so it stands to reason that they could probably do without the house phone altogether.
I’m not so sure I could do it at my house, yet. I still have two children under 18, one over 18, and there are a lot of phone calls throughout the day and night. While the oldest has his own cell phone, the younger teen shares a cell phone with my contract business (for emergencies only) and the 6 year old, well, she doesn’t need one. But both my husband and I have a cell phone. In a few years, we may be able to do away with the house phone and just keep the business-class DSL.
That could save us $60 a month, at least.
But until that day comes, I also have to look at where we can save money in this tight economy. Paying over $100 a month for house phone and DSL plus another $150 a month to keep five basic cell phones active is feeling a bit overwhelming. I realized this morning that our house phone bill is $30 higher than it should be, because we pay an extra fee each month to have a “metropolitan” line. You see, we live in the country. Not really, I’m only 11 miles from work and it’s all suburban between my house and “the big city,” but AT&T thinks we live out in the middle of nowhere and that if we want a line that is toll free to call and be called from “the big city,” then we have to pay an extra $30 a month. Yet, our “bundled package” also comes with free, unlimited long-distance. So if it’s “free,” why am I paying for it?
I’m thinking that we can drop the extra charge for “metropolitan” calling and bring that phone bill down. My family has unlimited long distance, so there’s no reason to worry that it will cost them to call me. The few calls we do get from “the big city” from businesses and etc. are limited, and why should I be paying for their convenience anyway? Let them pay for it themselves.
$30 doesn’t sound like much, I know. But $30 a month, over the course of a year, is a nice chunk of change. And I can think of lots of places I could spend that extra $360 right now.