Slashdot Mirror
Elderly 'Hit by Line Rental Charges' (bbc.com)
An anonymous reader shares a BBC report: Recent increases in line rental charges have hit elderly people the hardest, according to an Ofcom report. Between December 2009 and December 2016, line rental prices had increased by as much as 49% for some customers, the regulator said. And of the people with standalone landlines in their homes, 71% were aged 65 or over. Ofcom recently revealed plans to make BT -- with nearly 80% of the UK market -- cut line rental costs by 5 British Pound ($6.1). A huge proportion (43%) of the 2.9 million households with a landline only are occupied by people aged 75 and over. "Older consumers are particularly affected, as they are more likely to be dependent on fixed voice services if they do not have a mobile phone or an internet connection," the report said.
I guess, the costs of maintaining the wires and the rest of the land-line infrastructure are largely fixed. So, as people — primarily younger ones, according to TFA — drop their traditional land lines entirely, the remaining customers see their fees increased.
Nothing to see here, nothing to do about it. Whoever feels sufficiently compassionate to "do something about it" can subsidize their favorite senior(s) directly — or help them switch to a cell-phone, etc.. I've switched two elderly couples I feel responsible for to IP-telephony years ago — they had mobile phones already — and now they don't even know, their "regular" phones use Internet...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
Every article about old people is them being too poor, stupid, etc to handle life. Let's go back to the old days, the days of Logan's Run, where only the young are around.
Other than the articles about congress where the members are old people who are rich and powerful and hmmm maybe Logan's Run isn't such a bad idea after all.
"Line rental" covers the cost of maintaining a phone line used for POTS and/or DSL. POTS (plain old telephone service) is the "old skool phone" you mention, and DSL (digital subscriber line) is an Internet connection delivered over higher frequencies on the same copper.
This probably raises a question among some of you: "So why even subscribe to POTS in the cellular era?" Even without considering the pricing structure differences between the U.S. and British phone markets, an advantage of POTS over cellular is that POTS lets you have an extension on each storey (as they spell it), so that you don't need to go upstairs or downstairs to answer the phone. In addition, POTS allows use of a fax machine. I know some federal and state government agencies in the USA still require certain tax records to be faxed; does Britain?
Its that thing where the Telco charges you a renal fee for the line between the street and your house. You know to "maintain" it. Much like the "daily connection charge" power companies charge people, and in the case of New Zealand this is as high as $2 per day!
http://i.imgur.com/UeZan.jpg back in my day this always did the trick.
Good people go to bed earlier.
As the number of POTS phone customers decreases, the cost of maintaining the infrastructure is spread over a smaller and smaller number of subscribers.
These people need to keep up with the times or go without the things they cannot afford.
Cellular service is very affordable for basic use. A budget phone and a year of airtime is probably cheaper than a year of POTS service.
I wouldn't mind seeing a subsidy for poor people who truly need a landline, e.g., for medical alerts.
---
According to the latest ruleset, this post should be modded as Vorpal Flamebait +5.
...prefers to tap out his messages on a telegraph. There's just no substitute for those clicks and pauses. But let me tell you, the cost to maintain my telegraph service between me and my one friend who uses it is criminally high! If someone doesn't do something to help me out soon I'll have to choose between my telegraph or my diabeetus medicine and that's just not right!
Come on editors, it is already annoying that some news are US-centric without any mention of it, but ... UK-centric ?
This is very much like the problem with the United States Postal Service. Now that we have e-mail, text messaging and all kinds of other ways to deliver digital content to each other, people don't write as much snail mail.
Which might very well be canceled out by the increase in online shopping compared to driving to brick-and-mortar stores. But then perhaps my perspective is warped by my day job. In the warehouse next door to my office, I can see a cart full of parcels that we mail through USPS because it's cheaper than shipping them through UPS Ground.
Is Royal Mail seeing the same shift in its business away from letters and toward parcels?
It's not like they companies actually lose money with people leaving POTS. The phone lines are still used for DSL and people have dry DSL. The telecommunications company are seeing an opportunity to take advantage of the less informed and saying "because of lower usage of POTS the cost of maintaining the entire infrastructure is up" while they make money on DSL subscribers and take advantage of people still on POTS which are increasingly the older population. Seriously, if a corporation has an excuse they can use to get away with actions based on pure greed, they will do it. As communications is now basically an essential service (especially if you have a physical disability), they should be under some price regulation.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
This has been solved for nearly 5 years now. Get a phone with wireless charging capability. I bought a Qi charging pad for $15 several years ago and put next to my bed. I just place my phone on top of it every night to charge it. Got one for my dad when I saw him having trouble plugging in the micro-USB cable, and he's been happily using it ever since. This is now a "must have" feature on any new phone I buy. I doesn't seem like much when you hear about it, but after you've used it you realize how much more convenient it is.
Probably different in every area but here on the N. Olympic Peninsula in Washington State, USA, the land lines are way more reliable than cell phone, especially when the power checks out for more than a few hours. Also, 911 location is more solidly established and the LifeLink service, where you wear a button that will call help, requires a land line. I still have a land line for the first 2 reasons, if I were older that later one might be important but I'm hoping to check myself out before that point.
It's only going to keep getting worse under the Trump FCC>
What, did he get elected President of the UK too?