I would be remiss not to talk about wireless cell phones as we begin 2006. I think some of the Grasshoppers could spin tales of horror on “cell phones out of control”. Well the latest is Grandson Nevin who signed a two year contract with multiple phones. He is 18. He can do what he wants. He wanted multiple cell phones. Ashley, his girlfriend got the second phone. One month into the contract (and after receiving his first bill), the cell phone idea perhaps wasn’t such a great idea.
I’ve got to do this! I remember when George and Nana Steger had a land line phone in Plymouth. They made it a party line so that the costs could be lower per month. That meant every time you went to use the phone there was the risk that another party might be on the line and you’d have to wait. Also someone trying to call you might encounter a busy line because of that other party. The cost per month was $5-$6.
We’ve come a long way baby. I pulled an article out of the Milwaukee Sentinel the other day that described a man’s family cell phone program. Here is the male chauvinist part of my story. His wife signed up for the family plan.
The first month, the bill was $499.53.
The second month was $356.09.
What the hell was going on? The deal gave his wife a cell phone for a monthly charge of $39.99. Each of three kids were added for $9.99 per month each for a total of $69.96. Remember this is all in addition to the family “land line”. But how could a family plan with 600 free daytime minutes evolve into a monthly charge of almost $500.
It is in the law of large numbers. 600 free minutes sound great until you divide by 4 people all using the cell and then divide by a 30 day period. That gives each user 5 minutes per day. I don’t want to plagiarize so I must give the article author credit. He said that 5 minutes per day is hardly enough to say “Can you hear me now”? Everything over 600 minutes per month gets billed at $.45/minute. 749 minutes really add up. Each call between family phones is charged twice. Once as an outgoing call. Once as an incoming call.
Then there is the 100 free text messages per month. Every thing over 100 text messages gets a charge. So 600 messages a month is not good.
Of course there are all the federal taxes and extra charges.
Here comes the Grasshopper talk. What the hell is so important that everybody has to be in touch with every other family member every minute of every day? Doesn’t anybody talk at home anymore. Oh yeah, I forgot nobody sits down to eat at the end of each day. We just went through a holiday season. Everybody should be talked out. I’d expect cell phone bills to drop because there is not much left to say. Right!
I’m not advocating going back to the party line. Cell phones have a valuable function in the business world and especially for emergencies. How ridiculous is it to have a phone for every member of the family? How about the dog?
So if you are looking at where your hard earned dollars are going, add up your phone bills and compare it to the old party line costs of $5-6 per month. Even accounting for inflation, the new bill couldn’t be more than $20-25 per month.
To use a line from the Music Man musical, a bunch of old ladies were talking and essentially saying nothing. The song “Pick a little, Talk a little, Cheep, Cheep, Cheep” fits perfect. Or Seinfelds “Yada, yada, yada”.
In closing, I wish Nevin good luck at managing his program. I hope he read the fine print.
Love,
Chas.