🚀 go-pugleaf

Following N.E.T's announcement of raising some of their rates on 1/15,
I begun wondering how one may offset some of the hike.
  (For those who did not yet hear about it: The measured and unlimited
monthly services will go up by $1.80, and the premium services would go
up by approx. $3.07 .)
  The monthly bill contains an "end-user access" charge of $3.50; it is
not mentioned in the phone book, and often not itemized on the bill
but apparently every phone line must pay this :-(
  Another common item is the "touch-tone" service - $.98/month . It
probably takes NET a special effort to monitor lines without this and
deny them the touch-tone service. Has anyone tried to use a touch-tone
phone on a line WITHOUT a touch-tone service?  I'd love to find out that
technically the current system can't block .....
  Any of the "custom calling services" ? Some may be useful, but who
needs Speed Calling ?
  Unlimited service costs more than 6-8 bucks above the measured one,
and gives unlimited service to your local area (your town plus the towns
surrounding it), which would otherwise cost $.016/minute (plus 1 cent
per call). I.e., it'll take more than (approx.) 6-8 hours of monthly
phone use (in the local area!) to make Unlimited service a good choice.
(Well, some modem-owners use that much in a single day :-)

  The announcement said "New England Telephone does not receive any
additional revenue as a result of the new rates". Sure, they spend 
the money we pay them on TV commercials :-)

-- Boaz

p.s. The above should serve to start a new thread.


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 Boaz Ben-Zvi <boaz@apollo.hp.com>        Home: (617) 494-1279  <boaz@mit.edu>
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 Boaz Ben-Zvi <boaz@crl.dec.com>           Home: (617) 494-1279  <boaz@mit.edu>
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