Cell Phone - full time? anyone doing it?

[Tedderbear]

I had a very bad experience with verizon (1.5 yrs worth)....since I switched to sprint, it's been great. Plus sprint is bk friendly as long as you didn't bk on them.

Not true. I bk'd sprint and before my case discharged I applied for another sprint phone and got my phone free $0 deposit but they did give me an account spending limit of $150.

[JusticeForAll]

What we ended up doing was keeping the landline and went to what Verizon calls the "budget" plan.

We will pay $9.95 a month to keep the dial tone, but will have to pay 7 cents per minute during the week and 3 cents per minute on weekends for OUTBOUND calls. INBOUND CALLS ARE FREE.

I'm going to try it this way for a month or so and will still make all outgoing calls from my cell, but this way, if someone needs to dial 911 from our home, they still can. This will probably work for us because there are only two adults in our household (no children). It might not work so well with a family because each family member would have to be diligent about not making outgoing calls from the landline and if they weren't you could run up a huge bill. Especially with teenagers or babysitters!

I really wanted to cancel all together because I wanted to save the $60 per month, but I still saved $50 per month. The 911 issue was worrying me, so I compromised.

We seriously considered doing our cells full time but realized that if we were out and a babysitter was home with the kids that they would need access to a phone line in case of an emergency. I suppose we could look into adding a third phone and always leaving it at home but my kids would think it's too cool and play with it and probably lose it. We have Verizon right now and we have really liked their service. Don't know what it's going to be like when we renew the contract. If they will be expecting a bigger deposit or not.

[Bobby'sGirl]

Hey, maybe I'll try that in January

Instead of dropping the land line entirely; I've had this number (landline) for 28 years so probably need an adjustment period for people to get my cell number into their address books. And just in case I need an emergency call...

Plus that Verizon land line is reporting "current" on my otherwise poor credit reports...

[SinkingFast]

Plus that Verizon land line is reporting "current" on my otherwise poor credit reports...

We have a Verizon land line and I hadn't even thought about them reporting on the Credit Reports!

I'd been thinking about getting rid of ours after we filed, just to save that money every month. We've lived without a land line before and did just fine. The reason I got it was for calls you don't wanna get at the grocery store. Doctor's office visit reminder that could easily be left on the answering machine at home type thing.

But you're right. Verizon does report!! Definitely a point worth considering in deciding whether to drop the land line or not.

[Mira4]

We did just the opposite. I dropped my Cell Phone (contact most friends/family via e-mail these days) and picked up a $10 dollar a month land line. I have a work cell if I need to make a personal call within reason. We save 20 dollars a month. First time with a land-line in years. I hate cell phones and how some people are constantly talking on them. I forgot how we survived before everyone had one.

[coolbreaker]

i want to get rid of my landline too... and use only my cell

[debtisbad]

Also, note the high taxes on the cell phone. To date, the prepaid phones are not taxed!!!! I cannot believe the taxes that are on the bill. Also the taxes are extremely high on the land line. I dropped land line and have no regrets. Basically, I dropped it because I was sick of the add on taxes!!!

[JusticeForAll]

True, so true. For me, it's like $20 a month in taxes for each. That's $20 a month on the landline and $20 a month on the cell.

I've been using the cell full time now for a few days, so far, so good.

Plus T-Mobile is coming out with a plan like Altell's Circle as well as UMA (at home wifi) where the phone will use the wifi router instead of a cell tower when you're at home and switch to the cell tower outside the home.

That means unlimited calling from home without using your minutes. The only downside is I'll have to buy a new phone capable of both new plans. But a huge savings in the long run!

[Jeepy89]

It's been over 2 years since we dropped our land line - no regrets. We have cable for our internet. Can't remember how much it has saved us - our cells are through nextel and we pay 70 bucks a month for both.

[anonymuse]

When my parents were travelling all over north america in their rv, we did a lot of conversing with a web cam--sounded better than the phone, cost nothing, and they got to actually see their grandkids.