Posts Tagged ‘Bills’

Psst! How Much Is Your Phone Bill This Month?

July 28th, 2010

How did my communications bill get so big?

I passed the $400 last month. I am stunned. In my wildest dreams and in my most outrageous household budgets I never allowed a figure like this. It covers my wife, two teenagers and me. Okay, I understand that it includes the phone, cell-phones, internet and TV, a lot of services all bundled with one company, which was guaranteed to save me up to 15% a month. But $400? For the same monthly payment, I could walk off the lot with a 2010 Toyota Corolla with no money down based on four years of financing.

Too easy

It all looks so easy and it’s so convenient. We can track our children 24 hours a day. We can work from wherever we are. We can stay in touch and be informed instantly about anything we want to know.

I’ll pay

I’ll end up paying with a rather forced smile. This communications account allows me to stay home and work from time to time, so I can’t complain about that. In addition all four of us in the house are downloading information of some sort all the time. The cell-phones are a godsend and none of would think of going out without their cell-phone.

Remember when

I remember that back in 1990, before the age of the Internet, I was spending about $60 or $70 a month on phone and TV. That’s the figure I always remember. Now we’re up to $400 a month. Some increase!

Necessity

We live in the communications age. There is a new device, a new chip, a new service every day. Speed goes up and the costs go down, everything except the bill. Says a communications consultant: “You would have that thought with unemployment rising and people working fewer hours and nobody getting a raise that one of things people would have cut would have been their value-added phone services, Internet services and cable. It turns out not to be the case. Look at the phone companies’ numbers, and how the number of wireless users is going up. Communications has become a necessity.”

Must have and must pay

It follows that if our telecommunications products mean so much to us, we are willing to pay for them. “It’s not just entertainment, it’s all kinds of things, it’s a source of music, a source of social connection, a source of information, a source of mapping. There are just so many potential uses.” One of things we learned during the last recession is that telecommunications services are untouchable.

Drop the land-line

Reports suggest that many people are ditching their home phones. That is a growing trend that is going to continue among younger people. Those people have found a way to cut their costs. If you have a cell phone you are always available and you need a landline in addition. And if the company is paying for the cell phone…? Now, what else can you cut?

Tags: Bills, Cell phones, Communications, Internet, Phones, TV
Posted in Economy, Finance | No Comments »