Many remain landline-locked in Porterville

Though data from the Central Valley Business Times suggests a progressive decline in recent years in the number of American households with landlines, cellular telephones have yet to replace the older technology, according to several area individuals and business owners.

The number of adults living in homes with a wireless phone, and no landline, increased from one out of six in 2008, to one out of four in 2010, and to three out of 10 in 2011, according to the 2011 National Health Interview Survey done for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The study also found that half of all adults renting a home had only wireless phones and men were more likely than women to have only a wireless phone. Hispanic adults were more likely than non-Hispanic adults to have only a wireless service in their home.

However, there are a large number of people who do not intend on getting rid of their landlines anytime soon.

Alarm systems, internet providers, and credit card readers that require landline connection were among the reasons listed by those who have decided against replacing their old phones.

“You would be surprised by how many people still [use landlines] and won’t switch. I get customers daily who still come into my work and purchase household phones,” said Kayla Holmes, an associate at Radio Shack.

For 24 years, the phone number to and location of Norris Furniture have remained the same. So, even though using a wireless phone to make orders would save money on long-distance calls, it isn’t a change owner Larry Norris is yet ready to make.

“My phone bill gets to be pretty expensive. I spend $500 to $600 to $700 a month,” he said. However, familiarity is key, and Norris being a regular customer to some of the manufacturers in Los Angeles and Orange County means that his phone number is easily recognized.

“If I were to call them on my cell phone, they might not even pick up,” Norris said.

Raul Perez, an employee at Jr.’s Furniture, on the other hand uses a cell phone to make merchandise orders while the business’s landline number is listed in the phone book for customers to call.

The same is true for Guadalupe Navarrete, who recently opened her boutique, Alexis Dreams.

For Ruben Delgadillo, who owns House of Brides, ordering dresses from companies in New York on a regular basis isn’t as burdensome an expense on his landline business phone as it would be if he didn’t place many of his orders online or stick to 800 numbers most of the time.

“I would love to not have to pay the phone bill, but we have to,” said Victoria Stark, owner of the formal boutique, Earth Angel.

Not only is the store phone connected to the alarm system and credit card scanner; she and her daughter Claire Stark believe that using a landline, in their case, is probably less expensive.

“I think it would be more expensive to eat up all of our minutes on cell phones,” said Claire Stark.

“There’s orders, customers, and calling on merchandise. There’s a lot of special orders, and I think if you had to call a lot of companies like we do, it would use up a lot of minutes.”

Using a landline, she said, also helps with keeping work at the workplace.

“I wouldn’t want to take all that home with me,” she said.

But she probably wouldn’t own a landline if it wasn’t connected to her internet.

“Telemarketers drive me bonkers, especially during my baby’s nap time, and anybody who needs me knows my cell phone number,” Claire Stark said.

William McCafferty, one of those adults who uses a wireless phone only, decided to get rid of his landline because he was constantly being called by debt collectors who were looking for the phone’s previous owner. He also moved to a house that didn’t require a landline for the alarm system.

“Lastly, with the advent of wireless internet, there was no need to have a landline. We gave a monthly donation to the phone company,” he said.

Elizabeth Rambo, who said she only owns a cell phone because it allows her to communicate with her children, had no complaints about her landline.

“I don’t want to give my cell phone number to everybody, and people who dont have a landline have to give out their cell phone,” she said.

“I would give up my cell phone before I’d give up my landline. We have this idea that we can demand someone’s attention right now, and I wasn’t raised that way. In my day, we only used cell phones for emergency.”

Installing a landline can be expensive. According to AT&T, a standard installation runs $125 for the first jack and $50 for every jack installed after that. A basic service connection is $40.

Also, according to AT&T, monthly rates for basic flat phone service in Porterville is $13.50 a month.