The Pulse Blog

By: Artie Megibben
Ever since Alexander Graham Bell magically transmitted his voice into the back room of his science lab, home landlines have been an immovable fixture in the American home. But more and more, some people are cancelling their landlines and letting their cell phones do double duty.

Recently, Ivan Seidenberg, the chief executive of Verizon Communications, told a group of investors that the home landline is a thing of the past. He told the group that his company is already making plans to reorganize itself to address this growing defection from the home landline.

But as Mark Twain once commented on the premature publication of his own obituary, “The reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.”

So before you cut the cord to the trusty home phone, consider the following: Many families have eliminated their landlines only to return to reconnect a few months later. There are lots of reasons why this trial separation simply isn’t working out.

Reasons people are coming back to their landline

Some people who made the switch back complained of not being able to get to their cell phone in time. It just became annoying. Take the 2 A.M. emergency call. Those calls wake us in the middle of our sleep and are more easily heard and answered if the phone is where it always is next to our bed, not tucked away in a yesterday’s hand bag or in the pocket of your jacket hanging in the closet. Landlines are like light switches, they don’t move on you. Something like that, for many people, is a big deal.

Many people returned to their landline because they felt the signal was cleaner and clearer. Too many cell phone conversations lost the signal in mid-conversation. Too many chats were hard to decipher. It was just too embarrassing to hear people saying things like “My cousin just had a heart attack” and respond, “That’s so wonderful!” because you thought they had said “My cousin just got a Cadillac.” That’s a surefire way to end a friendship.

Other people who had discontinued landline service found themselves back because of a home fax machine that, as it turns out, is utterly unusable without a phone line. There are others who return to the landline for an Internet connection for their home computer.

And then there are those with home security systems who discovered after they discontinued their home phone service that their security system contractually requires a home landline. Which of course, makes total sense.

But most of the folks who returned to landline service did it for far less specific reasons. There was simply a general sense of comfort that the home landline provided them. Their cell phone had its advantages when they were on the go, but it made an unsatisfactory substitute for the landline. One returning landline rejector put it this way, “I carry moist towelettes in my purse to freshen up, but I wouldn’t think of using them at home to replace my morning shower.”