on friday, the 1st of august, i decided that should not be paying the phone company for something that i do not use. and that is my landline phone service at home. i have had a cell phone since 1995 and it took me this long to get rid of my landline because i saw it as insurance in case i need to call 911 from my home. the thought is that with a cell phone, the 911 call centers may not be able to locate where you are calling from with enough accuracy to find you in time. however, all landlines are associated with an address. so it's easy to find you. and even if the method of triangulating your position with cell phone technology is 100% accurate, it's only acurate to pin-point you on a 2-d map. so if you happened to be in an apartment building that is 6 stories high. triangulation can't tell you which story you are on.
i knew all of this when i decided to cancel my home phone service. but i was willing to take the risk anyway. 24-hours after the cancellation, i picked up the phone to see if there was still a dial tone. to my surprise, the dial tone was still there. then i decided to dial up my own cell number to test if it still worked. it didn't. there was an automated message saying that the line is not in service and that i should call the phone company to activate service. but right after that, the message continued on to say that for emergencies, i should dial 911.
needless to say, i was totally surprised. i am not saying that this is the case with everyone who's cancelled their landline service. i'm still not clear on the reason. perhaps it's a law similar to a cell phone's ability to make 911 calls even if there isn't a sim chip in it (for gsm phones) or even if the bill was never ever paid and service was cut off.
anyway, i'm glad i took the risk and it paid off. i was able to put into storage two phones (two less wall warts that constantly drain electricity) and i just replaced them with an old-school phone that just plugs into the phone jack but did not require electricity. you should always have one of these old school phones anyway, since it works without electricity. chances are that both electrical and phone lines will be out of commission in a large emergency (think major earthquake). but there is still a chance that phones lines will still be intact and working.
so if you have kept your landline all these years as insurance for 911 calls, you should call your phone company and ask about the ability to make those calls if service is cancelled.
