Do you have both a cell phone and a landline phone? Why? When you stop and think about it, the only phone you probably need is a cell phone. It will do everything a landline phone can do and more. Way more. If you have even a basic cell phone, you can probably use it to send texts and write e-mails. And if you have a smart phone, you can use it to browse the Internet, play games and get the weather. Can your standard home phone do that?
How much are you paying your local phone company?
If you look at your local phone bill carefully, you may be shocked at all the excise fees and surcharges you’re paying on top of the cost of your local phone service. Our basic service costs only about $30 but when you pile on all those surcharges and excise fees, the bill balloons to more than $60. You will have to pay some of these fees with a cell phone but not nearly as many as with your standard phone.
Use VoIP instead
If you feel you just absolutely need to have some kind of a home phone in addition to your cell phone, you should look into a VoIP-based service such as Vonage. You may be able to get unlimited local and nationwide phone calls on Vonage for $25 or less. However, you have to have a computer in order to take advantage of VoIP service and if your lights go out, so does your phone.
When you cut the cord
If you do decide to cut the cord on your local phone service, make sure that you have a cell phone plan you can live with. Most cell phone plans are priced based on a number of minutes. If you don’t use that phone very much, you might be able to get by with a 200-minute plan. On the other hand, if you talk a lot, you might want to get a 500-minute plan. You also need to decide whether or not you want Internet access and the ability to text, as these are usually cost extra.
If you have several family members, make sure that calls between family members are free so these calls will not use up any of your precious minutes.
Dial around or 10-10 plans
If you really want to save money on your long distance calls, you can use what’s called a10-10 or dial-around plan. If you choose to do this, you will dial 10–10, a three-digit number and then the number you’re calling. This is called a dial-around plan, because you’re dialing around your local phone service. These 10–10 plans can save quite a bit of money if you make a lot of long distance calls, especially international calls. However, before you sign up for any of these plans, read the fine print so that you will understand exactly what you will be paying for.