Finally found a use for an old fax

[tonerhead]

The Mrs and I still have a land line. I know. We still have several elderly relatives that use it to call us, as they have for the past 35 years, that is why we still have it. As we buy online, create new online accounts, etc we always use our landline as a primary number. We just let caller ID and the answering machine screen any calls on it. Be it as it is we receive upwards of 20 calls/day from political surveys, sales inquiries, etc. On Monday I was checking insurance quotes online and the landline was ringing every 5 to 10 minutes and I think we racked up 50 calls on Monday alone. On Tuesday we received more than that yet. Tuesday night I pulled out the old fax, blew off the dust, hooked it up, and turned off the answering machine. Wednesday we had 50 calls, Thursday about 25 call, and today (Friday) no calls as of about noon. Hell, a fax machine works better than the "Do not call" list which I constantly renew.

My suggestion to all of us out there is that we buy any used faxes at 50 cents each and resell them to people with landlines as a marketing call deterrent. Imagine the profit we could make. People would probably buy them by the dozen.

The landline has been a plus to help keep junk calls off of the cell phones. We are using basic talk (VOIP) from Wally World at $14.50/mo. Should probably check for something cheaper.

Now if I could somehow hook a fax to my cell phone.

Any comments greatly appreciated.

[KenB]

Re: Finally found a use for an old fax

I like it!!

[copyman]

Re: Finally found a use for an old fax

Not to sound stupid but are you setting fax to auto receive letting the fax pick up so the solicitors hear those funny fax tones? Reason I ask is what happens if those old relatives call?

Funny, that is exactly why we still have a landline, just for a few older relatives, was thinking about turning it off and just giving relatives our cell phone #'s. Another reason I want to drop the landline Verizon is forcing me to give up my copper lines and go Fios. They ran it down my street about a year ago and I've been putting it off. I would like to keep the copper lines but they disconnect service if you do nothing and not reply to their letters. I don't like anything with a battery backup which the new fios has. 8 hours and no phone. With copper lines electric could be out and phone still worked! Oh well guess that's what cell phones are for.

[driving lots of miles]

Re: Finally found a use for an old fax

Also the older relatives is the reason we still have the land line, And I also use it when I have to fill out some of the more stupid online forms and don't want to give out my cell#.

[tonerhead]

Re: Finally found a use for an old fax

Not to sound stupid but are you setting fax to auto receive letting the fax pick up so the solicitors hear those funny fax tones? Reason I ask is what happens if those old relatives call?.

Not an issue. We still check caller ID at the end of the day. If a relative calls, we get back to them and explain what is going on.

Side note: I did a little checking and magic jack is now $35/year with 19.95 to transfer your previous number. Will be going to that plan from the WallyWorld Basic Talk plan. In a little over 3 months we will have saved enough to cover the entire year of service. I remember looking at MagicJack about 5-6 years ago when we switched to WallyWorld, at that time the reviews weren't the best. Current reviews look pretty good though. Any thoughts out there? I do like the idea of a $3/month burner phone number even if it is land line. I also like the idea of traveling and taking my landline with.

[NeoMatrix]

[gneebore]

Re: Finally found a use for an old fax

I keep the landline for three reasons. First because it is the number I have had for over twenty years so all my relatives and friends know it. Next I can use if I really want to confuse the hell out of my nieces and nephews I plug the old rotary phone in. It would really shock the heck out of them if I could find the old candle stick phone I had when I got my first phone in NJ nearly forty years ago. But that thing probably ended up in some landfill a long time ago. And the third reason is I live in an area where there are only two different cable phone services, wireless cell service, and the one landline company is AT&T. I keep that because after my experiences with the local cable company I just do not want to deal with them again. Never could understand why after five years of basic cable service and limited numbers of channels I had to pay an increase of fifty percent without any increase in channel selection. So I got a pair of rabbit ears and cut the cable saving myself nearly seventy dollars a month. I tried cable internet way back when speed was limited to five meg. Was not happy with the service interruptions and the speed while at times was lightning fast compared to dial up. The speed was the same as dsl and the dsl was about 25 percent less than cable had increased to .

Surprisingly I am now seeing ads for "ultra-speed" dsl where speeds are increased to 25 meg/sec The only bad part is the one company offering it also requires bundled services and I am quite happy with what I am paying for now. Over-the -air broadcast tv gets me close to twenty-five channels. I mean really I live alone and do not have a need for multiple pc's connected and three or four cell phone lines so do not need blazing fast speed. The current six meg/sec fulfill my requirements just fine. Oh yeah I guess some of you guys would consider me one of the elderly phone users since I am approaching 66 years old. But I have been using cellphones or handheld radios for work since 1978 when they were still analog and not digital. I did use a smart phone prior to retiring. It did come in handy when I needed a quick check of a webpage to get some tech pointers or the office sent a text to all techs. A blackberry was actually better for me when I had to send a text because it had a keyboard instead of a touch screen.

[tonerhead]

Re: Finally found a use for an old fax

And now (as Paul Harvey used to say) the rest of the story. I got an "IRS" call on my cell today. I left it go to my voicemail. The ID10T left a message similar to this. This is Agent Alexander Lee calling for the US Internal Revenue Agency it is critical that you call me at 256-906-3843 as there is a warrant for your arrest. This is not a hoax (uh-huh) this is an actual IRS telephone number (uh-huh). I thought this poor fellow was cranky because he needed some better health insurance. So I did a reverse lookup of the phone number which originated in Ranburne, AL 36273(supposedly). I am willing to bet there is a 1040 W2 street in this town of 3,000 (1040 tax form, W2 income statement) So needless to say I filled out the same health insurance quote form that I did for myself before this post. I hope that shuts his callback number down for today and tomorrow

Oh and a parting thought. I listed this guy as being born 4-15 (which is tax day) 1991. A young 27 year old should have lots of quotes coming

[gneebore]

Re: Finally found a use for an old fax

And now (as Paul Harvey used to say) the rest of the story. I got an "IRS" call on my cell today. I left it go to my voicemail. The ID10T left a message similar to this. This is Agent Alexander Lee calling for the US Internal Revenue Agency it is critical that you call me at 256-906-3843 as there is a warrant for your arrest. This is not a hoax (uh-huh) this is an actual IRS telephone number (uh-huh). I thought this poor fellow was cranky because he needed some better health insurance. So I did a reverse lookup of the phone number which originated in Ranburne, AL 36273(supposedly). I am willing to bet there is a 1040 W2 street in this town of 3,000 (1040 tax form, W2 income statement) So needless to say I filled out the same health insurance quote form that I did for myself before this post. I hope that shuts his callback number down for today and tomorrow

Oh and a parting thought. I listed this guy as being born 4-15 (which is tax day) 1991. A young 27 year old should have lots of quotes coming

So funny to hear about another IRS call. The local stations are running ads by tax attorney firm that are pretty scary as to what the IRS can do. But the phone calls have like you mentioned a phone number to call them back and get "instructions" on proper payment. A common set of instructions involves going to a store and buying Itunes gift cards and giving them the serial and pin number to pay you past due taxes. You keep the card as proof and your receipt. Oh yes I do get the same so called IRS calls about on a monthly basis. Funny thing is I have noticed that the calls are now a tape that plays and then the call hangs up immediately when finished.

[Iowatech]

Re: Finally found a use for an old fax

[QUOTE=gneebore;663366Next I can use if I really want to confuse the hell out of my nieces and nephews I plug the old rotary phone in.[/QUOTE]

For what it is worth, here's a stop motion

from Youtube of how rotary phones were built. I've posted it elsewhere on CTN already, it's pretty low rez, and set to the song "Don't call us" by Sugarloaf, so if you don't care for that you might want to mute the volume or not watch it at all.