Well, I finally did it...
5After keeping the same landline phone number alive for 38 plus years (ever since we moved into this house, before phone number porting was a thing), we finally decided to relinquish it. It started out as a regular local Telecom landline, then about 14 years ago it got converted to a VoIP using an Ooma set up from woot!. That set up saved me a tremendous amount of money over the years, and when we moved my parents down here we set them up with an Ooma from the get-go. We now rely on our two cell phones, and I realized that I wasn’t even checking the answering machine for the VoIP… ever…
In retrospect, it would have made sense to port one of our phones from our old number but at the time we got our first cell phones unlimited calling was not available (except nights and weekends on some plans). Plus it was convenient when calling other family members to be able to use more than one handset at a time.
So, it’s the end of an era for me. Anyone else out there still have a landline? Still using an Ooma (from woot or meh or elsewhere)?
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I would still have my landline if the underground copper wiring hadn’t gotten fried when there was a water main break in the area. Since Verizon wouldn’t repair it, I then paid to keep the number for a few years and had calls transferred to my cell phone. Since my new phone has a dual SIM card, I ported the number to my cell, so now I see two sets of bars at the top and can get calls from 2 different numbers. I had the landline number for 30 years and wasn’t ready to give it up.
@heartny And if you gave it up it would have been a huge pain to notify a zillion people and businesses of your new address. I just moved and my list of whom I need to notify of my new address is around 100 places and people.
Some years ago I had ported my landline to my cell and I think I might be stuck with it for life as that is the only phone number my adult kid has memorized. She loses her phone on a regular basis and changes her number frequently, not telling anyone, which is a pain. I am listed as a back up on things and then I get called.
I still have a landline because it uses the same fiber-optic cable as the internet. Cell phone connection to a tower will vary with the time of day and weather, but usually has 1-2 bars. On a perfect day, I can get 4 bars - cause for a small celebration. So the cell phone usually connects through wifi at home. If the electricity is out, then so is the router and its cell phone connection, but the landline phone still works. The ringer on the landline phone is turned off because no one I know ever calls it. I will leave the answering machine on for the ones who want to sell me insurance, salvation, hearing aids, miracle cures, or let me know that my (nonexistent) grandson is in jail in Tijuana. They can be amusing.
@rockblossom
My local cell reception was spotty for a long time but TMo has apparently up their game locally (finally).
@chienfou Mine has gone the other way. Back in the day when I had a Motorola flip phone connecting to a 3G tower, I almost always had 5 bars - or maybe 4 in bad weather. As the 3G was replaced with 4/5G and my flip phone was replaced with newer models, the bars have steadily dropped. I would happily go back to a 3G phone for emergencies, but there are no towers left to connect to. If I spent a lot of time really off the grid, I would go to a satphone, but the monthly service cost is a bit steep.
I converted my old landline to a Google Voice number that rings to my cell phone, giving me an additional communication path when wifi is available but cell service isn’t. (Although my cell carrier allegedly supports such, its performance has generally been worse than what GVoice does, possibly because of better compression on GVoice, but that’s just a guess.) GVoice costs me nothing to maintain.
@werehatrack Same - transferred our former landline number to Google Voice - it rings on the multiple wireless handsets scattered around the house and also rolls over to my wife’s cell phone.
We live in a rural area in a house with a metal roof - cell reception can be spotty inside, thus the GV “landline”.
@macromeh @werehatrack
Hmmm… Never thought of that. Didn’t realize you could port a number to Google voice.
Oddly enough my daughter does. She says anytime anything requires a phone number that she doesn’t ever want to hear for she gives that number. The phone doesn’t ring. There is a phone attached to it it can be used but the number is only there to collect spam. It was part of a package that she grandfathered in years ago so she basically doesn’t pay for it
@Cerridwyn I have a $5/mo (very limited number of calls and data - both roll over) ancient SE with a cracked screen that is my spam phone. Probably 600 or so unread messages, tons of phone calls (have the volume off). My real phone (landline transferred to cell phone) gets almost none. Have an email for that too. Occasionally having that cheapy phone is useful in a different way. Can call my other one to find out where the heck I put it.
I still have a landline with the same phone number. Had it since I bought the house in 1979! Thought about changing a few times but it was never a better deal$$. Then it was the phone number that the kids all knew by heart, still do! Then I was diagnosed with heart issues and had a monitor that worked best and affordably with the land line. No worries about power outages! Still have it and use it for the phone number I give out with websites, sweepstake, and other nonsense because I can screen the call and have the answering machine take calls.
We hung on to copper until Verizon allowed it to degrade (illegally?) beyond repair. Then they tried to strong arm us into paying to attach fiber to the house. We went to Spectrum + Ooma at that point and haven’t looked back.
Spectrum had recently gotten up to $100 for internet only, but luckily we have “competition”. I showed them a Frontier offer to switch for $35, and they knocked our bill down to $45, so I will take that as win.
Don’t get me started! I had my landline, copper wiring, since 1989.
Last Oct I got a letter from AT&T telling me they were no longer going to accept new orders for landlines, but that I could keep mine…then the next month they disconnected it!
For months I’ve been going back and forth with them, listening to their lies about how it will be restored ‘by tomorrow night at 8’ or ‘Monday evening by 6’. They started by telling me that it was a cable cut at a ‘facility’ and since then I’ve heard every excuse including ‘utility work’ to ‘someone stole the copper’…none of it true.
I sent a complaint to the TX PUC, and the office of the president of AT&T called me the next day. Long story short…they won’t fix it, and all of my contacts through the years who have that number haven’t been able to contact me.
I finally got a cell and had the number transferred to it…after they FINALLY released it.
Two days ago, they called again…told me that they wanted me to add internet. When I told them they had disconnected my number, they told me it would be fixed by “6pm tomorrow night”. I laughed in his face!!
Now I can’t get the money back from the bills I paid without service.
I think I’ll sue…
@Tadlem43
What a shitshow!
I ported my 40+ year old land line number to Ooma free which is running on TMo 5G internet.
The monthly taxes are around $6 which is a cheap price to divert most spam calls, and everyone has the old number so we do get some calls on it. (Like when I forget to turn off DND)
@2many2no
This is what I had done as well. I finally realized that I wasn’t even listening to the messages for months at a time so decided to take that $6 and use it towards my VMP here.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
@2many2no @chienfou Too late to help you save the money now, but I’ve had my GV number tied to a cordless answering system with Obitalk for probably around 20 years and the only cost was the initial purchase of the interface device. Although the official Obitalk service is now defunct, my Obi device and GV are still linked and I still get weekly spam calls on that line. I just set the answering system to play a recording of the “beep beep beep the number you have dialed is not in service…” message in the hopes of some of them eventually removing my number from the list. I only use that line now for cell phone testing or the very rare occasion that I might need to send an old fashioned fax. If I need to make a purchase on a site that I don’t yet trust but requires a number, I generally use that number.
KuoH
@2many2no @kuoh
Yeah, if I had thought about it and I would have certainly ported that number to GV. I didn’t realize that was an option before as I thought you could only get a randomly assigned number.
@2many2no @chienfou @kuoh Yeah, I have the same setup - GV home “landline” phone via Obitalk HW. Works well enough and free is a very good price!
If the GV+Obi ever quits, I guess I’ll either switch to something like Ooma or see what else is available when the time comes.