Penny Pinching Mom

Cell Phones in the Mountains

Out here in the boondocks where I live, we have few cellular service options. There are two providers that offer local numbers here: The small local company Hubby and I are with, and I think U.S. Cellular. If you want to go with a different company, you have to go down the mountain and get a number that is long distance from here.

I guess the bigger companies aren’t interested in offering service here because of the small population and the difficulty of getting a good signal. We’re fortunate to be able to get a clear signal at my house by some miracle, but at our old place we could only get a signal good enough to hold a call (with lots of cutting out) on the back porch. Now I can take advantage of our provider’s unlimited long distance, so that saves us a little money.

Our cell phone company doesn’t offer a lot of the stuff the big guys do. They don’t have a very good selection of phones, and you can’t use an unlocked phone that you buy elsewhere with them. And I wish they had a less expensive family plan. We have way more minutes than we need on the plan we have now, but it’s the smallest one they’ve got. But they are the best option available to us right now.