In doing my taxes this past weekend, I realized that we spend a LOT of money on telephone service! We have a land line as well as cell phones.
We did consolidate our cell plans into one and now do a family plan that shares minutes — doing that alone saved us around $80 per month, but we’re also paying for that land line. My sisters both gave up their land lines in favor of cell phones only, but they are in fairly urban areas. I can’t do that because we’re
- so far out in the country, there are no towers close by
- live in a doublewide trailer so signals don’t travel well within it.
While we’re going to replace the trailer with a modular home in the next few years, we could be saving another $50-60 per month if we could lose the land line.
Someone told me about a portable cell phone booster that’s on the market and some of my research so far indicates this might be an answer that would fit our situation. I know that saving that amount of money each month would go a long way towards being able to afford that new house (as in it would help us pay down some debt that much faster).
The particular portable cell phone booster I looked at has added benefits of extending cell phone battery life (presumably because the phone isn’t constantly searching for a signal) and works with all the major carriers – since we’re on Verizon, it would work with our carrier. Being portable means that when we go on trips, it could go with us and our phones and provide us with access to family and friends (as well as the dog sitter!) without worrying that we were out of range of a tower or roaming.
The only thing stopping me from getting one right away is my concern over the DSL connection — I’m thinking the phone company won’t give us the DSL unless we’re also getting phone service as well. It’s something I have to verify before I make the commitment to getting a portable cell phone booster and cutting off the land line. The literature also says this booster works with most air cards, so I suppose I could trade off the DSL for wireless. I’m a bit cautious about committing to that because wireless is not always as robust as I need it to be and since I work from home often. I need a reliable, robust and fast connection.
Do any of you use a cell phone and booster? What is your experience with it? Is it as good as it’s presented on the websites? Did it help you with the overall number of dropped calls and/or call quality? Have you experienced any downsides to using a portable cell phone booster with your cell phone? Did it cause you any problems with your phone itself? It looks bit bulky — does the size or weight of it interfere or impede with your mobility?
Thanks for any and all input and for helping me reach a decision!
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Have you tried to see if any other service company gets better coverage in your area than you do? That might help. Also, with your landline, maybe if you’re not going to make a lot of outgoing calls, you could be on a measured-rate service instead. That’s what my roommates and I have. I need the phone for the intercom since I do quite a bit of online ordering and they need the phone for DSL. Since we all have our cell phones however, we’re just on a measured rate service. We probably pay about just $15 for that (not including the DSL). Also, if AT&T is reached in your area, they have a nice bundle plan too for all three of those I believe, or something else. But they can take care of your wireless phone, landline, and DSL all in one company.