In reply to a post by BLaZiNgSPEED:

Thanks for clarifying, I've heard of that but completely forgot of that option. But it's actually quite expensive transferring to a third party VOIP. Their services are £5-£20 a month!

The majority on here use AAISP for VOIP and it's like £1.44 a month, complete with a customizable control panel.
Transferring/migration is free.
£1.20 setup fee.

BT charge £5 a month for their proprietary, locked down VOIP.

Edited by j0hn83 (Thu 30-Nov-23 14:45:17)

I pay £2 for telephony on a PAYG basis on BT DV

In reply to a post by ian72:

For 99% of the users broadband speeds and reliability are the number 1 priority when switching provider. Most people will not really care about losing their phone service

84% of statistics are made up on the spot...

I suspect that is not a realistic statistic. There are a fair number of people who would have had the same number for years and have shared that number with lots of friends, family and companies. For some of us (like me) the landline is less important and I dropped it completely last year and the house is now solely mobile but for others the landline number is almost a part of their identity - and I suspect a lot more than 1% of the country fall into that group.

Yes, it is true that a fair number of people would've kept the same number for years and may have been shared amongst friends, families and companies. But how many of those are really keeping the same number for the sake of close contact or are just naturally keeping it because they need broadband?

Actually you can determine by how many of your friends, family and companies still contact you via the landline number. I'd expect that most of them are contacting you via social media like Facebook, Skype, Whatsapp, Mobile phone.
I know my dad's friends haven't been in communication via landline phone for years not since 2004, which was the last time I remember my dad using the landline to call. We just disconnect the phone line and don't care about it any more.

I suspect it is going to be a niche of users mainly older generation of people like pensioners who keep landline and not bother to use the internet because some don't like technology and computers because they think it is too complicated.

You don't really see people on these forums consulting for support how to get just landline phone service without broadband. Obviously this is normal as it is a broadband forum. But majority of the users care more about the internet and have pretty much abandoned their landline phone number. While some few people are unaware that there are cheaper sim deals on offer like RWG or 1pMobile.

So this migration to Digital Voice is only going to affect a very small minority. I don't think most of us will worry about losing our landline phone number or care about changing it. I changed my landline number when I initially switched to TalkTalk 3 years ago because the old number had spam calls and we know that these missed calls and voicemails were not from friends but telemarketers. This was causing broadband drops occasionally. Since changing number my issues stopped and with Digital Voice it completely solved the problem that I once had.

For many having a landline phone number is actually an unnecessary nuisance. Most people just want to have broadband and not bother with landline phone service. Phone service should be an optional feature and with Digital Voice that's a step in the right direction.

You're young. You're landline number might not mean much to you but it does to others.

It meant nothing to me to drop my landline number that I had for about 10 years. The phone never rang for the 1st 5 years and the 2nd 5 years there wasn't even a handset connected.

Think of people who have had the same landline number for 20, 30, 40 years. That's the number used by relatives, old friends, Doctors, hospitals, etc etc.

For 99% of the users broadband speeds and reliability are the number 1 priority when switching provider. Most people will not really care about losing their phone service

The majority don't care about a landline number. However I think it's probably a little more than 1% of users who care about their landline number.
Even many of the younger techy users on these forums have migrated their landline number to a 3rd party VOIP provider.

I suspect it is going to be a niche of users mainly older generation of people like pensioners who keep landline and not bother to use the internet because some don't like technology and computers because they think it is too complicated.

You don't really see people on these forums consulting for support how to get just landline phone service without broadband. Obviously this is normal as it is a broadband forum.

No, not because it’s a broadband forum … it’ll be because it’s online 🙄

In reply to a post by j0hn83:

Even many of the younger techy users on these forums have migrated their landline number to a 3rd party VOIP provider.

I'm 50 and did that 4 years ago when moving from FTTC to cable as the number was 25 years old and I had no idea whom might try to contact me via it.

I'm not that young, I'm 34 years old and in 3 months time I will become 35!

I've gone through my first Dial-Up since 1998 when I was 9 years old. I remember the old days when I started playing chess online on MSN Gaming Zone and my dad told me, "I'm now going to pick up the phone to call a friend, quickly finish your game" as the internet will disconnect!

Those days are still in my memories. Chess, Checkers, Reversi, Backgammon, Spades, Hearts, etc were the first games I played online on Dial-Up internet. It was with Barclays pay as you go service provider a CD-ROM installation with a Sagem F@st modem. Then Diablo 2 was the first PC game in the early 2000 that I'd play online.

Then I remember the days of ADSL when we switched to Tiscali in 2003 and it was like 128Kbps and in 2004 it was 1Mbps. The landline phone was still a problem causing issues with drop-outs but the internet was still usable while making phone calls unlike on Dial-Up where the internet would not work.

Eventually my dad bought a Nokia 3210 and even I had a Nokia 3330 in 2004 at 15 years of age using O2 pay as you go back then.

This is when things changed. All my dad's friends also bought mobile phones and gave their new mobile phone number and pretty much abandoned the old landline. There came a point when no one was interested to give their landline number any more.

There was a time when only for a few seconds a friend will call via mobile and say to login to Skype as Skype calls are free.

My dad is a Medical Doctor and I do remember locum agencies calling him on landline and sending emails about various job offers around the UK. He would work in different hospitals in the UK for a few weeks/months contract. Eventually he gave his mobile number. The same thing happened with our local GP, dentist, etc.

There was no longer a compelling case to have to give our landline phone number anywhere as friends didn't either. Calling 1471 regularly resulted in no missed calls from anyone other than some spammers.

Multiple times we have changed our landline number. In 2020 after maybe 10 years we finally changed number as part of our FTTC upgrade with TalkTalk and since I no longer had spam calls with this new phone number I safely migrated to BT FTTC using Digital Voice in July 2022. BT did port the number to the new DV service successfully. But porting the number was mostly a case of switching provider smoothly otherwise we didn't really care about the number.

We've only experimentally used the service to call each other with the new dect phone to test what the service is like. Digital Voice is definitely better from our test compared to the old analogue service, much clearer sound quality and the line has zero crackles.
But nevertheless none of us have really used landline to call anyone these past 15-20 years or so and with the new DV service, I'm not sure how much special attraction it will bring to the customers. 1% doesn't seem like a very big deal of users. I'd be curious to know how many of these young techy users prefer to use a 3rd party VOIP provider by default compared to a mobile sim deal.

I've had my landline number, at four addresses, for more than 40 years. It is now on VoIP with A&A. It hardly rings these days but I keep it because it might be useful and it doesn't cost much. Don't use it for outgoing because my sim-only phone contract has unlimited calls.
The NHS prefers to have mobile numbers where possible, because it means they can text appointment confirmations, reminders &c. The same for the dentist.
I have a 1Gb fibre broadband service and wired my house for ethernet, which will all be running at 2.5Gb when I've changed one more switch. I assembled my PC for the umpteenth time since the 1980s earlier this year.
I'll be 75 in a few months, so don't assume that all oldies are technophobes. I might not be typical but I'm not alone either.

I've had our landline number since moving here 14 years ago and keep it because so many elderly relatives and friends have it and use it. Also my wife hates mobiles and refuses to use one for calls! Like the previous poster I'm getting on a bit (80) but very competent with technology and have no problem building PCs, installing networks and tinkering with anything technical. Our landline number will follow me to Zen when I move from Virgin in the New Year.

Edited by HughA (Sun 03-Dec-23 09:58:16)

In reply to a post by j0hn83:

In reply to a post by BLaZiNgSPEED:

Thanks for clarifying, I've heard of that but completely forgot of that option. But it's actually quite expensive transferring to a third party VOIP. Their services are £5-£20 a month!

The majority on here use AAISP for VOIP and it's like £1.44 a month, complete with a customizable control panel.
Transferring/migration is free.

Actually, I believe there's a £15 charge to port in your existing number:
https://www.aa.net.uk/voice-and-mobile/number-portin...

If you have phone+broadband and you want AAISP to take them over, then renumber the phone line to export the number to VOIP whilst keeping the line active, they can do that too but it's more expensive (£44.40)
https://www.aa.net.uk/voice-and-mobile/number-portin...