We routinely receive inquiries about the usefulness of land-lines and whether one should keep theirs.  More and more people these days are ditching their fixed phone and opting to stay in touch with friends and family via mobile phones or VoIP software such as Skype (Etilities Forum).  As far as we can tell working with our customers, the people opting to keep landlines tend to include families with young children, and elder individuals who need that quick and easy way to call 911 or other numbers during emergencies.  For my family, we primarily want to make sure there is always a phone line available for the babysitter to call us if something comes up.

For the rest of you who are willing to trade land-line for an alternative but find that your domicile lacks appropriate coverage to toss the fixed phone away, Verizon (Etilities Forum) just gave you one more reason to do so.  The company recently started offering a book-sized device to enhance and boost your wireless coverage indoors. This type of device is generally known as ‘femtocell’, and is being called the “Network Extender” by Verizon. It will run about $250 and, unlike competitor Sprint (Etilities Forum), Verizon will not charge a monthly fee for the use of the device.  Once plugged into to your local network, the booster enhances your signal around the house and gives you one more reason to save money.  For more information, see Verizon’s page on the Network Extender.

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