Don’t get sunk by the tech wave
News Room | Columns by CUB's Executive Director | Don’t get sunk by the tech wave
June 25, 2009—A recent national survey found a record number of cell-phone only households (20.2 percent). While that may be the best option for some consumers, I'm not ready to dump my own landline just yet.
Don't get me wrong. I don't shun technology. I love my Blackberry, I'm a fan of Facebook, and I've watched You Tube and Twitter bring us the latest from the embattled streets of Tehran.
But what good is a new technology wave if it washes too much of your money down the drain?
CUB's Phone Savings Center, 1-866-688-4282, can show you that plain old telephone service is still a great option—from dirt-cheap long distance with an automatic $20 credit to the CUB-created Consumer's Choice local-calling plans that cut phone bills by hundreds of dollars a year.
So before you dump your landline, consider how your traditional home phone can join forces with today's exciting new technologies to cut your costs:
Don't get me wrong. I don't shun technology. I love my Blackberry, I'm a fan of Facebook, and I've watched You Tube and Twitter bring us the latest from the embattled streets of Tehran.
But what good is a new technology wave if it washes too much of your money down the drain?
CUB's Phone Savings Center, 1-866-688-4282, can show you that plain old telephone service is still a great option—from dirt-cheap long distance with an automatic $20 credit to the CUB-created Consumer's Choice local-calling plans that cut phone bills by hundreds of dollars a year.
So before you dump your landline, consider how your traditional home phone can join forces with today's exciting new technologies to cut your costs:
• Most people waste hundreds of cell-phone minutes each month, but CUB's free Cellphone Saver can show you how to trim your wireless bills. Consider downgrading to a cheaper plan with fewer minutes, or even a prepaid cell-phone service. Supplement it with a low-cost long-distance plan like Pioneer Telephone's Rate Buster. With rates of just 2-3 cents per minute and a CUB-negotiated $20 credit, the wireless industry will have a hard time beating it.
• Lots of people get sucked into expensive Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) services, which carry calls over a broadband Internet connection. But cheaper VoIP services can fit in nicely with your traditional landline service. MagicJack, for example, offers unlimited nationwide calling for $40 in the first year, and $20 annually after that. That's right. Less than $2 a month!
Of course, NEVER buy broadband just for the sake of getting VoIP. Plus, sometimes the magicJack service gets poor marks—and if your Internet or power goes out, so does your phone service. So, consider keeping your home phone as a backup. You can buy Consumer's Choice Basic ($3.05 to $9.50 a month) for local calls and use magicJack for long-distance calls.
• For international calls, Skype can be a good option. It's a VoIP service that offers international rates beginning at about two cents per minute. Skype freely admits that it's not "a replacement for your primary telephone service" but it can be handy for international calls. You talk over your home computer, using a microphone or headset, but that doesn't seem to bother people who love the free calling to other Skype users anywhere in the world. JaJah offers similarly low rates (for example, 3.3 cents to China or free to another JaJah user)—and you actually can make calls over your regular landline phone.
As you can see, there are plenty of ways plain old telephone service can get along with the latest technology, even under one roof. At CUB phone-bill clinics across Illinois we see plenty of landline lovers who have perfected the art of riding that technology wave—without getting swamped by it.