You don't need to be an 'investor' to invest in Singletrack: 6 days left: 95% of target - Find out more
We are getting more and more nuisance calls on our landline, does Sky Shield actually work?
Cheers
It worked for me in so far as my Sky-provided landline packed in three years ago, I couldn't be arsed to report it and I've had zero nuisance calls ever since.
It worked for me in so far as my Sky-provided landline packed in three years ago, I couldn’t be arsed to report it and I’ve had zero nuisance calls ever since.
Kinda +1, people still use landlines?
I expect it does. In my job I have to call landlines. Sky shield and similar make you say your name then press hash before they pick up. So it screens your calls for you and you know which ones not to answer. Doesn’t stop them calling though.
Personally we signed up to the telephone preference service years ago and nuisance calls are rare
TPS didn't stop them calling us, they don't care. The TalkTalk screening service blocks the call if they don't give a name, which seem to work. We've had very few cold calls since we've used it, and almost none where they give a name and we don't want to speak to them.
When you hear the name you get a choice, accept this call and whitelist the number, accept this call only, or block this and blacklist.
We found registering with the TPS helped reduce the number of nuisance calls considerably but didn’t entirely eliminate them.
However since we have decided we have no need for a landline phone to be plugged in we don’t get any 🙂
Has done its job for us, its still plugged in with an answer machine.
Probably don't need the phone but can't take the plunge just in case.
TPS will stop legitimate nuisance calls. It won't stop criminals calling you, because they're criminals.
Probably don’t need the phone but can’t take the plunge just in case.
In all seriousness, "just in case" of what?
The only people who ever rang my landline were PPI chancers, "I believe you've been in an accident that wasn't your fault is that correct?" and my mum. When mine died I went "meh" and told my mum to ring my mobile instead.
I can see very little compelling reason to have a landline in 2020 other than as an ADSL bearer. Even if you've got crap mobile signal at home there's ways around that now with boosters and such. Somewhat perversely, I've just had Virgin cable internet installed and I've had to have a new landline installed that I do not want and will never use because it's considerably cheaper than not having one. Even the salesman, once cornered sufficiently, admitted that it made little sense to him either.
Kinda +1, people still use landlines?
Not everywhere has a decent signal.
Even if you’ve got crap mobile signal at home there’s ways around that now with boosters and such.
Do they work in power cuts?
When our house phone rings it takes me a while to realise what’s happening as I forget we have one. By this point the call has rung off. Works a treat for avoiding nuisance, or any other type of, calls.
Do they work in power cuts?
Fair point, that is one fringe use case. Though to be honest, if I lived in an area that a) had no mobile signal and b) was prone to power cuts then I'd have a UPS or if it was particularly chronic / rural then a back-up generator.
We used to have a pile of analogue phones in a cupboard at work for exactly this reason, until we outfitted the call centre with UPSes and threw the lot in the skip.
Signed up for TPS and this worked to an extent. Removing us from the councils open electoral register did the rest.
Only realised my home phone was broken when I logged into the router and realised there was a list of missed calls. Didn't recognise any of the numbers and haven't bothered to fix the phone 🙂
BT does the job for us too. We then add 'allowed' numbers to the handset, so folk don't have to say their name first.
Probably don’t need the phone but can’t take the plunge just in case.
We thought the same so plugged in a phone and turned the ringer to silent. The thought process being, it’s there if we ever want/need to use it, but we haven’t given the number out to anyone we know, so any calls inbound will be chancers.
We have never used it.
[edit] just looked, it’s no longer plugged in.
Kinda +1, people still use landlines?
Yes. It’s what my broadband runs on, and my Sky Q box is connected to. I can’t see how I could use a cellphone for home use when I’m not at home, and my g/f needed to use the phone; she has a mobile dumbphone, but it’s easier for her mum to call the landline, and cheaper for her too, but frankly I’d much rather my broadband was connected to a landline rather than a cellular network, because it’s faster. Maybe, sometime in the next twenty years, or before I die, we might, possibly, get 5G around here, but I’m honestly not holding my breath, it was nearly six years after the introduction of 4G before it turned up in this neck of the woods.
Neither sets of parent will call our mobiles because "calling mobiles is expensive".
It does not matter how many times we try and explain 'free minutes' on their mobiles. In fact my mum got quite cross with me when I said I was going to cancel our land line to save us money as "it saves you money at my expense!"
My FIL also has this big thing about his privacy so withholds his number. This means we cant even use a decent blocking service. One day I might buy one of the those call screening units so he has to press a button every time he calls..... That will teach him 😉
MIL phones everyone's mobile and then the home phone. So if MrsF doesn't answer, my phone rings, then the kids, then the home. TBH our home phones are usually out of charge !
Kinda +1, people still use landlines?
Yes. It’s what my broadband runs on
Landline phone not the landline wire.
I don't really understand the rest of your post. You want something for home use when you're not at home; your girlfriend also has a mobile so this means you need a landline phone; her parents struggle to dial an 11-digit number starting 07- rather than a different number starting 01- (or 02-) because these are wildly different concepts; and they're labouring under the notion that calling landlines is cheaper when the actuality is that both are free unless you're on a calling plan from the 1980s.
It does not matter how many times we try and explain ‘free minutes’ on their mobiles. In fact my mum got quite cross with me when I said I was going to cancel our land line to save us money as “it saves you money at my expense!”
"You call and hang up and we'll ring you straight back."
"Oh dear, it's broken."
We have a landline phone tucked away for emergencies. 2007 when Sheffield was flooded and I was knocked off my bike the power was cut and the cordless phones didn’t work and the mobiles ran out of juice. It was a mission to find a shop that sold a straight plug in the wall phone but we found one in the end.
Come the apocalypse we can just plug that in (or I’ll just use my ham radios 🙂 ) but other than fringe cases I can’t see us ever plugging one back in.
@Cougar that might work....especially as my name on here is based on my real life 😉
Oh, are you Mrs Tandbroken's lad?
Is this the same as Skynet?