Landline Telephones

[Archive7]

Just wondering if anyone is still using landline telephones to make telephone calls.
Mobile phones contracts these days offer unlimited phone calls and SMS messages and they are really cheap because of fierce competition.
I am still using a landline phone because it carries the internet ADSL infrastructure. I could save a little money if I ask to have it only for the internet, but then no incoming or outgoing phone calls from the same company.
The trend these days is to sign up for a bundle contract (Internet+ISP) from the same company which works out a lot cheaper than separate internet and ISP.
I don't find making calls with a mobile convenient. Perhaps if there is a handset (Bluetooth ?) like the one that comes with my landline telephone, then it could make it easier for me.

 

[rolfw]

Still got one here, mostly for my 86 year old Mum, she doesn't get on with mobiles, rarely use it myself, but is useful having a local number for business.

Edited to remove mother's exaggerated age. ;)

 

[Archive-8]

I have a land line plugged in, sadly I still need to use my truecall unit(blocks sales calls)

All the time I have had this number I have only ever had genuine 2 phone calls.

My telephone is supposed to do SMS over the landline, never used it so don't really know what it costs.

The only reason I have the landline is because I have to have it so I can have the net, otherwise I probably would stick to just mobile only.

 

[sonnetpete]

We have VOIP bundled in with our Orange broadband deal. Free calls to pretty well anywhere though obviously we lose our phone line if the power goes off or the modem goes down. Mobile coverage is patchy here, so relying on that isn't a viable option.

 

[Archive-8]

Voip is a very good option, I have an account with orbtalk it's a local area code, it's pay as you go, but you do have to top it up once every six months.

I have a voip adapter in Yeovil and in Sherborne, + app on my iPhone so anyone ring that number I can answer it anywhere.

I only use the voip for 0845 type calls or any that's going to cost me, plus if it has any fraud on the account then the most anyone can click up is my £10 credit I keep on there.

 

[Lazarus]

No, no Landline in use for me.

I get Broadband by Fixed Wireless Access and simply ported my old Landline number to a VOIP host.

Cheaper by far, more reliable, and far higher quality.

What's not to like?

 

[Archive7]

Just ordered a retro handset Bluetooth to use with my mobile for calls.
One step forward to help me decide to cancel the landline.

 

[Lazarus]

Still got one here, mostly for my 806 year old Mum, she doesn't get on with mobiles, rarely use it myself, but is useful having a local number for business.

That would make you around 780 years old, @rolfw . Is it down to Quinoa?

 

[Archive-8]

Just ordered a retro handset Bluetooth to use with my mobile for calls.
One step forward to help me decide to cancel the landline.

View attachment 108495

A mate of mine has one of them for his iPhone, he gets some odd looks when he is out and about.

 

[Archive7]

A mate of mine has one of them for his iPhone, he gets some odd looks when he is out and about.

I wouldn't take notice of anybody who gives me an odd look.
People who walk about alone and seem to be talking to themselves and laughing, they are the crazy ones.

 

[Lazarus]

Especially the ones with a Babelfish stuck in their ear.

 

[Adam792]

Ours sits behind the TV gathering dust as that's where the phone socket is.

As our broadband is BT, you get the landline phone connection by default. I just bought the cheapest wired landline phone I could find in Asda for about £6 to have plugged in.

Never ever use it. If it ever rings (only ever marketing or a wrong number) it frightens me half to death!

 

[Analoguesat]

Still have the landline as its the only way to get our (pitifully slow) broadband connection. The phone is not connected unless we want to make a call. Mobile coverage is spotty here at best- we have known the local mast to be off for months over the winter.

 

[Terryl]

I strictly use a land line, as cell phones do not work up here in the Boonies, and if someday I were to go to a land line free option, the big problem I would run into is in case of an emergency, on some cell phones the 911 calls are routed to a highway patrol call center outside of my area, re-routing the call to my local center takes time.

Also we have a direct call setup in case of fire,(they call everyone in the area) I like this option as it has saved some locals from being burned out.

VOIP is OK, but what happens when the powers out? Or if the local cell site has a problem? (swamped out due to an emergency) A land line phone is a must around here, and if you don't need to make long distant calls then there are really cheap pricing plans for just local calls.

 

[Lazarus]

In our case, the FWA provider is local and highly responsive.

Where there have been outages, the system is re-routed within minutes.

The local node (Indeed, all of them) have UPS systems and Autoreboot.

The VOIP provider also has redundancy built in.

And now our Overhead Elec Supply has finally been buried underground, stability is high.

I think I've had about ten minutes downtime on my VOIP in three years.

Contrast and compare with the time it takes for BT Openreach to respond to Landline faults.

No contest.

 

[PaulR]

Yes we have a landline and use it a lot. I have an anytime contract which gives unlimited calls to landlines in the UK and about 40 countries together with 1500 minutes to UK mobiles.

The bill I get helpfully lists the calls we make and in one month up to the 4th of July we made 95 calls made up of nearly 5 1/2 hours of calls to UK landlines. They don't give the time for the mobile calls but looking quickly I reckon about 1 in 5 by quantity. There was one call to France taking just over 3 minutes and one call to an 0845 (grrrr) number. The 0845 number cost £1.24 on top of the plan but the connection charge is included as part of the plan and saved £4.00 compared to a plan with no inclusive minutes.

The plan saved me 76p for the call to France, £45.73 for the UK landline calls and £71.10 for UK mobile calls. So I reckon I get my money's worth.

By contrast I make a £10 credit last about a year on my mobile and my wife is more profligate needing topping up every 8 months or so.

 

[scopus]

Yes, as mobile signals around here are at best, crap!

 

[Terryl]

I also hate it when the string gets wet, you get a lot of dropped calls.....Could also rust the can.

 

[2cvbloke]

Still have a landline here, because conveniently, if I were to get a VDSL package without the line rental it costs more than it does WITH line rental!! And of course there's no wireless broadband service here, so that's that out of the question...

Just ordered a retro handset Bluetooth to use with my mobile for calls.
One step forward to help me decide to cancel the landline.

Shame they can't seem to build them toys with the handset the right way round, as demonstrated with my Canadian 2500 telephone...

 

[Archive7]

Still have the landline as its the only way to get our (pitifully slow) broadband connection. The phone is not connected unless we want to make a call. Mobile coverage is spotty here at best- we have known the local mast to be off for months over the winter.

Sorry to hear that you still have slow broadband connection.
Have you considered internet over satellite? I know that it could be quite an expensive solution but two way seem to be a well established company.
Tooway – Fast internet everywhere » Our subscription offers
What I am interested in is to know if the special LNB (transmit and receive) needs a special license from the Ministry of Communications or not.
Gilat which is an Israeli company probably provide some of the equipment, but I have never heard of anyone here who is getting internet over satellite this way which is probably because of the licensing issue.
Of course a better reason is that we have a much cheaper solution using ADSL
Here are two interesting video clips. There are a lot more on YouTube

Edit: Just read that it is possible to get a £350 subsidy if eligible. Might be worth the try.
https://www.freedomsat.co.uk/better-broadband-subsidy-scheme