Do You Need a Landline?

July 26th, 2010 Joel Beattie Leave a comment Go to comments

Lynnae McCoy is a freelance writer, homeschooling mom, and frugal living enthusiast. She writes about frugal living at Being Frugal.net and about balancing work and homeschooling at Freelance Homeschool Mom. When she has a rare spare moment, you can find her on Twitter.

With the economy still struggling, many people are scrutinizing their bills, wondering what can be cut and what is necessary. Since most people have cell phones these days, its understandable that the need for a landline is questioned more and more.

For some people, getting rid of the landline is an expense worth cutting. For others, though, it makes more sense to hang on to the old fashioned phone line. Here are some things to consider if youre questioning your need for a landline.

Do you have young children in the home? If you have young children in the home, I always recommend keeping the landline. My primary reason for this is that 911 services still rely heavily on landlines to accurately pinpoint the location of an emergency call.

Kids can easily be taught to call 911 in an emergency. However, in the face of a high stress situation, I dont want my young child to have to remember his address. He knows it, but if something were to happen to me at home, I dont know that hed be able to do much more than make a phone call if he were in a panicked state of mind.

How reliable is your cell phone service? If you dont have young kids at home, and you have terrific cell phone service, dropping the landline might make a lot of sense. On the other hand, if you cell phone service is spotty, keeping your landline ensures that you always have phone service available.

Do you use a security or health alert system? Some security systems and health alert systems rely on landlines. If you use one of these systems, check with your service provider before losing the landline. You might be stuck with it if you want to keep the service.

While getting rid of the landline makes sense for young people on the move, those who have young children, are older or who spend a lot of time at home should consider carefully before going without regular phone service.

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