Why the insistence on having a 'Home' phone number?

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#489766 5-Jul-2011 18:44

If you have family in OZ / UK / US it is a lot cheaper for them to call an NZ land line than an NZ mobile.

Generally known online as OpenMedia, now working for Red Hat APAC as a Technology Evangelist and Portfolio Architect. Still playing with MythTV and digital media on the side.

Dunnersfella

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#489769 5-Jul-2011 18:53

But cheaper again to call them on Skype...
3GB of data on our iPhones means that the home phone is a thing of the past in our household.

SandyJ

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#489774 5-Jul-2011 19:16

openmedia: If you have family in OZ / UK / US it is a lot cheaper for them to call an NZ land line than an NZ mobile.

Agreed. Wouldnt and couldnt do without my landline. I pay an extra $30 per month and get unlimited LL to LL (2hrs per time) international calls, which is handy because I ring the States every morning and Oz 3 times a week. I love telecom for that scheme, although Im sure they dont reciprocate. lol

BurningBeard: Reasons I've kept my landline:

- I don't expect people to have to pay to call me
- Mobiles are great when I'm out and about, but they just sound horrible for a long conversation
- Before the power came back on after the ChCh earthquakes, an old phone got me back in touch with some people

And those are the exact same reasons I keep mine. My mobile wouldnt work yet my landline/internet connection hung in there the whole time.

vexxxboy

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#489776 5-Jul-2011 19:17

or in my case, i dont have a mobile phone never have never will. hate them.

Common sense is not as common as you think.

muppet

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#489795 5-Jul-2011 19:59

So the main argument against having a landline is "I'm Tight"?

I can think of many reasons to have a landline and many not to. Just accept the reason you do want one (or don't need one) doesn't always apply to everyone.

Agree with original poster, in this day and age making a landline compulsory is silly. I expect it's much cheaper for them to ring you for "surveys" using a landline though.

Audiophiles are such twits! They buy such pointless stuff: Gold plated cables, $2000 power cords. Idiots.

OOOHHHH HYPERFIBRE!

oxnsox

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#489799 5-Jul-2011 20:07

muppet: ..... (edit).... in this day and age making a landline compulsory is silly.

Probably weeds out a lot of potential entrants who may be deemed low value or higher risk...
A landline owner is 'an account holder' with an easily traceable credit history....

muppet

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#489800 5-Jul-2011 20:08

oxnsox:
muppet: ..... (edit).... in this day and age making a landline compulsory is silly.

Probably weeds out a lot of potential entrants who may be deemed low value or higher risk...
A landline owner is 'an account holder' with an easily traceable credit history....

Ahhh yes, of course. Very good point.

Audiophiles are such twits! They buy such pointless stuff: Gold plated cables, $2000 power cords. Idiots.

OOOHHHH HYPERFIBRE!

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freitasm

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#489813 5-Jul-2011 20:39

BurningBeard: Reasons I've kept my landline:

- I don't expect people to have to pay to call me

So *YOU* pay up to $50 a month so other people can call you free? Use mobile only, and if anyone wants to call you, they pay. You save $50 a month this way.

Since we use cable here we don't need copper. We ported our landline number to WorldxChange VFX, and pay $10 a month for our line. If wasn't for that, we would rely on our mobile phones only.

Sure, a landline has its merits, but not for everyone. It costs a lot for low usage customers.

NonprayingMantis

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#489814 5-Jul-2011 20:41

my grandparents in the UK would never use Skype, and would be way too expensive for them to call my mobile.
So I have a landline for them to call me, and me to call them.

It comes in handy too for my wife's long chats with her friends in wellington.
Sure, she could use her mobile, but that would involve getting a much larger (and much more expensive) plan.
say 2 hours of calls per week (minimum!), that is over 500 minutes just on national calling. To exclusively use a mobile even on 2Degrees we are talking the $129 plan (600 mins) and she really only needs about 50 minutes of mobile calling a month. (which would be $29).
Much cheaper to use the landline than mobile where she can get unlimited national calling for around $60 all up,

pih

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#490059 6-Jul-2011 14:03

SandyJ:
openmedia: If you have family in OZ / UK / US it is a lot cheaper for them to call an NZ land line than an NZ mobile.

Agreed. Wouldnt and couldnt do without my landline. I pay an extra $30 per month and get unlimited LL to LL (2hrs per time) international calls, which is handy because I ring the States every morning and Oz 3 times a week. I love telecom for that scheme, although Im sure they dont reciprocate. lol

So you pay around $70-80 a month (line charge + add-ons) for unlimited LL calls to Oz and the US?

I pay $15/mo on VOIP which gets me 4000 local minutes and 500 minutes a month to US/UK/Oz/etc. I could pay $35 to get 3000 overseas minutes and 50 NZ cell minutes (that's more than 1.5 hrs calling/day!). Overage is so dirt cheap it's not worth thinking about, there's no 2 hour limit, call quality is at least as good as a landline, I can pick up calls on my mobile or in my office or on my laptop (or none of the above, depending how I feel), I get a dedicated landline number and separate dedicated fax number, email to fax and fax to email, conference calling room and 3-way calling, voice messaging that goes to my email, remote callback and a hundred other features that I never use. Did I mention that I'm paying $15 a month for all this?

A few more things:
- it's free for people to call me - anywhere
- calls to NZ cell phones were about 25c/min last I checked
- I can receive calls overseas or anywhere there's an internet connection as if I was sitting at home (I use a local data SIM card in my mobile when overseas, and have a VOIP client installed)
- I can make NZ calls when overseas at no cost to me [edit: clarification "when"]
- You can use their PC-based client for (video) calling like skype, PC-PC calls are always free. And free plans are available, so you can sign up your mother overseas and talk for free for as long as you like

I know the debate is over keeping the landline (and implicitly over whether to just use a cellphone instead), but this is a great, low-cost alternative that bridges the gap for me and will do so for some time yet.

Using 2talk, no affiliation, just a satisfied customer.

Ragnor

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#490069 6-Jul-2011 14:15

Telecom wholesale has done a stellar job lobbying in order to keep the difference in regulated access prices for Naked DSL to only $10-20 cheaper than DSL with POTS/landline.

If you have a DSL connection (not in a cable area etc), $10 higher for a landline with free local calling is still fairly compelling.

Only recently in the last month or so have Snap and Vodafone offered naked plans with more than a $10 difference to their standard w/ landline plans.

The gap needs to be bigger till it's attractive to drop the land line imo.

I would like to see the regulated (by the ComCom) wholesale access cost split into: line rental, dsl service and landline service for clarity.

blakamin

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#490092 6-Jul-2011 15:10

freitasm:
Since we use cable here we don't need copper. We ported our landline number to WorldxChange VFX, and pay $10 a month for our line.

Was that A TelstraClear number you ported?
Do you have TV on your cable as well?

We don't use the landline much anyway and would rather put the mrs on a mobile plan instead of prepaid with the money saved from no landline.

jaymz

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#490114 6-Jul-2011 15:34

Interesting seeing all the comments basically saying "who uses land lines these days?"

How do you all get past the issue where some 0800 numbers do not allow calls from mobile? Or have you not had this issue?

For me, a landline is a small cost to be able to have:

1. free local calling, can talk to friends down the road for as long as i want
2. not have to use a computer to talk to someone, i spend all day in front of one, don't want to do that while at home!
3. Not to have to use a mobile phone to talk to someone
4. Can call any phone number and it will connect (back to the 0800 number issue)
5. is very usefull in emergencies, can call power company if power is off (eg cellphone not charged, PC off)

blakamin

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#490116 6-Jul-2011 15:39

jaymz: Interesting seeing all the comments basically saying "who uses land lines these days?"

How do you all get past the issue where some 0800 numbers do not allow calls from mobile? Or have you not had this issue?

For me, a landline is a small cost to be able to have:

1. free local calling, can talk to friends down the road for as long as i want
2. not have to use a computer to talk to someone, i spend all day in front of one, don't want to do that while at home!
3. Not to have to use a mobile phone to talk to someone
4. Can call any phone number and it will connect (back to the 0800 number issue)
5. is very usefull in emergencies, can call power company if power is off (eg cellphone not charged, PC off)

1 Never use it, will text. Or visit.
2 use mobile
3 use mobile (Easier to find than house phone most times it rings)
4 Haven't had that issue since ANZ allowed 0800 calls from mobiles
5 Couldn't do that anyway (our house phones are cordless) Car charger :)

jaymz

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#490121 6-Jul-2011 15:56

blakamin:

1 Never use it, will text. Or visit.
2 use mobile
3 use mobile (Easier to find than house phone most times it rings)
4 Haven't had that issue since ANZ allowed 0800 calls from mobiles
5 Couldn't do that anyway (our house phones are cordless) Car charger :)

Valid points, and it is really an individual's choice when it comes to it. Different strokes for different folks!

I have always had a corded phone at home, when i was growing up we lived in an area that tended to have power cuts (trees on lines etc) and a corded phone was the best way to check on neighbors, or contact power companies to report faults. Christchurch is a good example of how reliance on mobile networks can be problematic.

I can't remeber the last company that i tried to call from mobile to 0800 that failed (telstra clear, or genesis) but that was a couple of years ago. Does anyone know if the problem is still out there or not?

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