Might give up on the CenturyLink landline

Probably late to the party, but it's getting harder and harder to justify the landline. Yes, having something hardwired is somewhat appealing. But we've had two power outages the within the past week and with cordless (hardwired base) phones, we lost service. One wall mounted, corded phone in the hanger worked. Also, CenturyLink has sub par old infrastructure here. The service guy who's here at least once a year, usually twice, said the problem is they won't spend money unless it fails. It seems to me, that having to patch distribution lines once or twice a year is failing. He said all the cracks in the insulation let the salt dust settle in and once you add a little moisture, broken wire.

We're paying 95/month for land line and 10mb internet (usually runs around 6mb), no cable or satellite TV. I can get Spectum cable 30mb internet (not TV) for 14.99/mo. I can port the home phone number to a Verizon cell for 20/mo, add 10/mo tax for both (probably not quite that bad) and it's still half the price for 3 times the connection speed.

I have my CenturyLink number on all my home business stuff, so I don't want to lose the number or I'd drop the line completely.

What am I overlooking?
Thanks

 

$50 x 12 months = $600 a year
$600 a year at 3% for 10 years is almost $7,900.

I dumped my copper line phone when it got to $45. I didn't need a fax at home and at the office any more. I was too far from the CO for DSL to be an improvement over dial-up. Ditched the $45 copper line phone to get $10 add-to-cable-TV internet and never looked back.
Now we've cut the cable tv but kept the internet and have $30/month smartphones and if the smartphone internet was just a little faster Comcast might be on the chopping block too. We just don't watch TV any more.
Cut the fat when there is a leaner method of accomplishing the same end result.

 

Nothing...I gave 'em the boot 10 years ago.
We have antenna TV (so free) and 2 smart phones (unlimited data) and 20 gigs of "hotspot" data, $70 total.

 

It is great that a lot of you have options when it comes to phone service, TV and internet. I have no cell service at my place, no cable for either TV or internet, so I will keep my Centurylink landline that provides DSL and Directv for TV. I am too old to maintain a TV antenna tower that is close to 250 feet from the house. The other morning I opened the door to the deck and saw a red fox running around and earlier I saw deer and turkeys taking a stroll thru my woods. I won't trade that for living someplace with more modern amenities.

 

Backwoods Savage Sounds like your place and mine must be related

 

You turn your phone into a wifi hotspot and connect your desktop wifi to the phone. Than you can use your phones data connection for internet.
I don't know if all carriers allow this though.

 

completely understand. Using a phone for a internet connection isn't the golden ticket anyway either. Unlimited data isn't unlimited.
As mentioned some carriers don't allow it either. Phone batteries die quick as well, phones overheat.
Use to live out in an area where dial up was the only thing available. It was worth it. But back than, websites still were optimized for dial up connections.
Now they think everyone is on a fiber connection and the ads alone will choke a dial up.

 

It's not that hard hooking your desktop up to Wi-Fi with a USB antenna. We use a jetpack from the library when we have Internet outages with CenturyLink. We do this to connect our boys desktops for homeschooling.

The problem with using your phone as a hotspot, at least with Verizon, is you cannot use your phone for texting or calls while in hotspot mode.

 

Hmm...works fine for me on Cricket wireless and a Moto e5 phone...we had the Verizon Jetpack previously...worked great, but was too spendy!

 

I ditched the house internet @$90/mo for a jetpack, it costs $20/ mo for 15 Gig of data. Gotta save those coins where I can.

I also tether my phone to the TV and use Hulu, hoping to wean the wife off of Dish


That'd cut that $130/mo bill outta the budget.

 

Yup, they not getting any moolah outta me for TV...heck we get almost 50 channels for free! (a few of them are duplicate though)

 

Well you know we haven't been able to find my shows so don't hold your breath.

 

wildwest is your amplifier inside the house or external?

You might consider a spare 12 V battery connected to a solar charger, combined with a low wattage inverter to power the amplifier during power outages.

Sure would give me some peace of mind knowing that I could make an emergency call if necessary.

$.02

 

By all means.


Edit.. no permission ever required.

 

So, you can have a device connected to your phone and the phone will still make and receive calls as well as texts? My Samsung Galaxy S7 won't do that on Verizon. Hummm. I need Verizon's North American coverage or I'd look at switching.