The Cell Phone Verses Landline Delimna

There is the question as to whether to give up a landline (aka phone service) in favour of cell phones only.  Some of our kids have totally eliminated their landlines and a couple after using only cell phones for a couple of years went back to adding a basic landline.  We have Bell for our landline, Roger's for my husband's cell phone and I put my cell phone of a pay as you go plan through Telus because I seldom use it. 

Here's the problem in Ontario.  We have Bell so pay $54.85 for a very stripped down service that includes caller ID and 500 minutes of long distance for North America.  They were none to pleased when we cut over $30 worth of extras about three years ago after buying a home telephone system offering call waiting, call blocking and all those nice features on board so all we need is call display.  The only feature on our landline that can be reduced is long distance but that won't save us much.  I pay $100 per year for my cell phone pay as you go plan with the only problem being it is only good in the US but I can unlock the phone, buy a sim card and plan in the US which would be good at our vacation home.  I very seldom travel in the US by myself so really don't need a cell phone there.  My husband pays $86 per month for his cell phone which has a data plan.

We looked at getting a new cell phone for me and eliminating our home landline.  A new cell iPhone was $199 special and adding a family plan was $50 plus $16 for caller ID and shared data ($66 total).  We would be up to $152 per month BUT if my husband changes his current cell phone plan that is no longer available he would also have to pay $16 for caller ID which brings the total to $168 per month.  We are currently paying a total of $151.43 for both cell phones and landline so giving up the landline would actually cost us more money for less.  Plus, we have internet and television with Bell so get a bundle discount of $21 per month that we would lose if we eliminated the landline.  After doing the math, we quickly realized giving up our landline in favour of cell phone only would not save us any money but rather cost us more while getting less.  Now technically, we could without changing out my phone, adding US coverage with no data but it would still cost us more monthly. 

I personally would rather go to cell phones only.  It really is a lot more convenient and quite frankly the younger generation has embraced cell phones, choosing to eliminate landlines.  There are a lot of benefits going to cell phones only as you have instant communication pretty much everywhere.   So far, the problem of telemarketers is very low as you aren't listed in a directory so the calls for the most part that you get are for you. 

The downside is cell phone numbers like landline numbers are recycled which means you can have a high volume of calls from debt collectors from the previous owner of that number but the cost of those calls can cost you in addition to your actual cell phone plan.  We dealt with this problem with both our landline phone number and my cell phone number since moving here in September of 2011.  They can be very nasty as well as threatening and if you are on a pay as you go plan can really eat up your minutes AND they will not remove the number from their database even if you request it contrary to the rules set out by the CRTC.  The problem is, you cannot block these calls on a cell phone the way you can with a landline.  The best advice I have after having this cell phone number for 18 months is to not answer the call, find out who they are via a service like Who Calls Me then report them to the CRTC. 

There's an App for That

Yesterday, I shared a few ways that mobile devices like smart phones, iPod Touch, iPad and Android tablets can help reduce paper clutter in the home.  The beauty of the mobile devices is they are multifunctional while being able to sync to other mobile devices, laptops or desktops.  These mobile devices are so popular that even airports are using the electronic version of your ticket rather than you having to print them out.  My husband has an iPhone and I have an older iPod Touch that is proving difficult to upgrade and a new iPad 3 with OS 5.1.1 but the iPhone and iPad sync nicely together.  We have it set up so if I enter an event or reminder, it automatically goes to his iPhone and visa versa.  This really is a very hand feature!  Apps are available through the App Store or the site owner's website.  The iPad is new to me so I don't know all there is to know about apps and there are pre-loaded apps on the iPad.  You can easily search the App Store for apps you would like.  There are many free apps some of which show ads and others can be purchased so are ad free.  Be warned some apps work on both iPhone/iPod Touch and iPad but some work on only the iPhone/iPod Touch.  Here is a list of a few I really like:

• Messages (pre-loaded) - This allows you to send text messages to another Apple device as long as you have Wi-Fi (home, hotspots).  It is free to send messages wherever there is free Wi-Fi as well.
• FaceTime (pre-loaded) - This app lets you have a video conference with other Apple users.  This is our favourite way to talk to the grandkids.
• Facebook - The Facebook app makes connecting to your Facebook easy peasy.  It is the app version of Facebook so Flash (games) doesn't work.  We stay in touch with our family and friends via Facebook when traveling.  My husband has a data plan for his iPhone and I use free Wi-Fi where available.
• YouTube (pre-loaded) - If you like video, the YouTube is a must have app.
• AccuWeather - This is an app by AccuWeather.com.  It shows the current weather, forecast and radar maps which can be quite handy not only at home but when traveling.  It is packed with a lot of useful information as well including health risk related to weather.  I really like this app!
• Twitter - There is a Twitter app available.  It is rather nice but depending on your mobile device you may be able to get HootSuite or TweetDeck.
• Maps - Maps is a nice app to have for finding your way around various cities and towns.  It doesn't take the place of a GPS but is quite handy if you are in a restaurant or airport without your GPS for finding directions and you can use the street view on the map to see what that particular area or building looks like.  It is basically an app version of Google Earth.
• Newstand - This is a great app for downloading free magazines, preview magazines and newspapers.  It takes you to their store where you can shop.  You can subscribe to magazines and newspapers like NYTimes.  A subscription is usually discounted a bit from the hard copy version but it looks pretty much the same.  The nice thing is it is a very convenient way to carry your magazine and newspaper subscriptions with you to read wherever you choose without the bulk of the hard copies.  You also have the option of buying a copy of your favourite magazine without having to buy a full subscription.  The really nice thing is when we are at our vacation home in Florida and I want a copy of my favourite Canadian magazine, it is only a click away.
• iBooks - This is a great app for downloading free eBooks and eBook version of other books including those on the best seller's list.  It does have it's own store and some sites offering free eBooks will download to iBooks.  There are a lot of free eBooks available in every gendre including a good selection of cookbooks!
• GoodReader - This is an amazing app that greatly enhances the usability of the iPad.  It opens files in a wide range of formats including video. 
• Buy Me a Pie - This is a great shopping list organizer that can be synced to your online account if you buy it for $2.99 or you can use the free version for one list shopping.

Garden Gnome
©2006-2012

Dealing With a BUD (Big Ugly Dish)

Painted BUD

July 10, 2010

We installed a 10 foot satellite dish affectionately known as a BUD short form for Big Ugly Dish.  These types of dishes were all the rage for quite awhile as they allowed those in rural areas to get rather decent television service where they couldn't via any other method.  We installed it because quite frankly the service was less than half the price of cable with a lot more channels.  In fact for a few years it was actually free via free-to-air.  Our satellite dish was one of the fancier black mesh dishes so it was not as obvious as the solid beige dishes but it was still a BUB! 

It is really difficult to camouflage a BUD because anything that blocks the dish itself actually blocks your satellite signal.  So while the BUD gives a lot of great entertainment it really is an eyesore.  The next house we moved to had a BUD, one of the ugly solid beige ones.  We had brought our black mesh one with us which was a lot more work than you would think.  We sold the black mesh one, left the beige one where it was because that would have been a huge pain to take down, and installed one of the smaller satellite dishes.  Like many we simply just left the beige BUD were it was.  These huge ugly dishes continue to in many ways pollute the skyline.  There was one here when we bought the house.  We took it down.  There is one at the neighbouring house to the house we have the conditional offer on.  They are hard to get rid of so in many ways leaving them where they are seems to be the resolution.

I've seen some rather interesting uses for old BUDs.  Golf courses use them on the driving range.  Some enterprising people have sealed or the solid BUDs or used them under pond liners to make shallow garden ponds.  Others have done as this person did, paint them up to add a bit of whimsy.  If painting you will need a tall ladder as most BUDs are 10 foot diameter and raised above the ground by at least 8 feet.  The BUD should be pressure washed first then allowed to fully dry.  Use a good quality latex outdoor paint to do the design.  If the design is complicated you will likely have to mask of certain areas.  Use a good quality paint tape.  Remove the pains as soon as possible to prevent the sun from setting the adhesive.

Garden Gnome
©2006-2010

Cleaning Out the Blocked Number List

Early last November I posted about our new phone system that freed us from using all but caller ID through our phone service.  Essentially this has saved us about $30 per month since we got the phone.  We have been extremely pleased with it's performance.  The only problem we've had is somehow accidently erasing the phonebook but that was easily fixed.  This phone holds up to 30 blocked numbers which is a real handy feature for avoiding telemarketers. 

The problem with telemarketers is they keep changing their phone numbers so as soon as you have one blocked they use another number.  If 3 telemarketers each have 5 lines they can use there's half of the allowed numbers to block by this phone.  The sad part about this is if you sign up to Canada's National Do Not Call Registry the calls actually increase as fines for calling are not enforced.  One of the worst things we did was put our phone number on that registry!

Today I found myself with the blocked numbers list full after getting 2 telemarketer calls so that meant it was time to clean out the list.  In the ideal world you could just empty it and start again but that doesn't help for the persistent telemarketers.  What I did was list the numbers then run each through Google.  Each number will come up in the search results usually with entries on 800notes.com or whocallsme.com.  Checking the numbers I found 2 that are now being reported as no longer is service and 3 iffy ones.  The US just did a huge crack down on telemarketers calling both the US and Canada so another 4 are quite questionable.  For now I'll delete the 2 confirmed dead and 3 iffy ones.  That will give me time to see if the other 4 are dead as well.  With any luck as the list fills up again I can start deleting from the oldest entries that hopefully discouraged by their unsuccessful attempts at calling us have moved on to greener pastures.

Garden Gnome
©2006-2010

New Phone System

When we were newlyweds there really wasn't a lot of choice in phones other than colours. They were corded units with no extra functions. Over the years as times changes with a busier lifestyle stand alone answering machines became quite popular. These devices used micro-cassettes but they served the purpose. The down side answering machines was of course power outages. Well Bell Canada saw they could be making more money off of customers by offering their own answering service (voice mail) and they sweetened the deal by allowing you to call into your voice mail from another location so you could hear your messages. This was an attractive feature for those traveling a lot but really was meant for the business people. At the same time telemarketers saw residential homes as the perfect market. Bell quickly started adding new features with one of the most useful being caller id that is a somewhat effective way of dealing with telemarketer.

The last phone system we bought had a built-in answering machine. We saw this as a way to eliminate voice mail from our phone service. If I recall correctly the system consisting of the base and two addition hand sets cost $79.99. It worked well for us for about 8 years but over the last couple of months it was apparent the system was dying. None of the handsets would hold a charge longer than about 5 minutes and two of the handsets lost partial parts of the display. It was time to go shopping for an eco-friendly solution.

Panasonic KX-TG6473 Phone System

Pictured is the Panasonic KX-TG6473PK eco-friendly cordless expandable phone system we purchased at Sam's Club for $59.99. This is the first phone system I've seen with the EnergyStar logo! It is also RoHS specified no chemicals used which includes lead, mercury, hexavalent chomium, and specified brominated flame retardants (PBB and PBDE).

The standby power consumption has been reduced by 59% over their previous model which means we use 10.52 kWh verses 25.83 kWh annually on standby. In terms of electricity savings that is $1.63 so nothing to get really excited about. However, calculation of our previous system that used 2 - 6.5 W and 1 - 18 W adapter the cost for that phone system worked out to be $28.54. The new system will cost $11.07 annual to operate at our current electricity rates. Again, an $11 annual savings doesn't seem like much but it gets better!

The phone system has a built-in answer, call block, call screen, call waiting, 4-way conferencing and ringer id all features that cost extra if using Bell Canada's services. The call block is not limited to just phone numbers either as this system allows the blocking of calls without phone number such as out of area, private caller, or long distance with no phone number identified. What this really means is that the only additional service we need from Bell Canada is caller id. That's it! This should give a maximum savings of almost $30 per month for 3 months then $24.95 for a total savings of $290.60 the first year then $275.20 annually depending on the plan we replace our current home complete plan (most expensive) with. So now that really is a savings but if we consider the new phone system also acts as an alarm clock we save an addition $6.31 in electricity. In short we stand to save $307.98 the first year the $292.58 each year after that making this purchase very frugal with a payback period of 2.3 months! In terms of combining frugality with being eco-friendly this ended up being an excellent purchase.

Garden Gnome
©2006-2009