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Giving up your landline

There are some affordable options to having a landline at your house.

Using your existing landline supplier

Your analogue landline costs about £15-£20 per month (or more). BT (and other resellers of the OpenReach network) are offering Digital Voice for the same cost as the old analogue service. However, some hidden extra fees may be added – beware.

If you use Virgin Media for your phone services, then VM will have converted you to VOIP, and you may be able to find the cost in your monthly bill.

Using your existing internet service

If you already have an internet service at your home (via broadband or FTTP), you can use this to get a new Digital Voice or VOIP service.

  • A&A offer a VOIP service for £1.20 per month – you need to pay for any outgoing calls, and there will be some one-time setup costs. A cordless telephone (with internet connection) would cost £120
  • Vonage offers a VOIP service for £7.00 per month, which allows you to connect your existing home phone to the internet (via an adapter provided by Vonage), without any additional setup costs. Vonage offers 1000 minutes of free calls per month

Using the mobile network

  • You can buy a simple 4G mobile phone for £25 and a SIM card for less than £5.00 per month – unlimited calls. This simple phone option offers calls and SMS, takes photos, and allows you to listen to the radio. There is no internet connection on a simple mobile phone like the Nokia 110
  • An alternative is to buy a cheap Android smartphone (for £50-£100) and a SIM card with some (5GB) mobile data (for £5-£10 per month). If you have WiFi at home, it can be used for much of your mobile data.

Look on Uswitch.com for cheap mobile phone SIM offers, but beware of those that have a low introductory price which increases after a couple of months. Most SIMs offer unlimited calls within the UK.

Summary of monthly costs

  • BT Digital Voice – no extra cost ~£15 per month
  • Virgin Media – no extra cost ~£15 per month
  • A&A VOIP on your internet service – £1.20 per month (pay for calls)
  • Vonage VOIP on your internet service – £7.00 per month (1000 free mins)
  • Simple mobile phone £5.00 per month (unlimited calls)
  • Smartphone £5-£15 per month (unlimited calls)