Shared minutes could make couples feel disconnected
By Beth Teitell
Tuesday, May 10, 2005

What, a 50 percent divorce rate isn't high enough for Verizon Wireless and the rest of the cellphone cabal? Apparently not, because they've given couples yet one more thing to squabble over.

Yeah, that's right, I'm taking about the so-called ``family plans'' the wireless companies are pushing. Don't be fooled by the family friendly name. Any plan that requires, excuse me, ``allows'' couples to share scarce and valuable resources is not likely to keep a relationship together. Just ask anyone living in a one-computer household.

The shared-minutes plans sound great. I mean, who wouldn't want to get 150 extra minutes for the same price? And yet, once you get past the advertisements showing happy families gleefully sharing minutes, you can already see how things will go down.

A pair of newlyweds goes into a wireless store, and becomes giddy at the prospect of their savings. Kissing and hugging, they imagine using the extra money for a down payment on their first house. But even as they're vowing to trust each other and check first if they need to go over their half of the allotted time booty, outside pressures would rear their ugly heads.

Doubts would creep in, and the couple would start thinking that maybe they should have shared a plan before they got married (even if their parents were against the idea), so they could have seen if they were truly compatible.

Let's see how sharing a plan changes the bride's behavior. She'd see her husband on his flip phone and instead of thinking how cute he looked cradling it on his shoulder, she'd be suspicious - not about who's on the other end, but whether that person is ``in network'' or not. And he, who's always been so generous, would start to begrudge his beloved her half-hourly calls to check her voice mail.

Toward the end of their first month together, as the minutes start to get really tight, the accusations will fly: ``You never wait until the `nights and weekends' period starts to make calls.'' ``You didn't switch over to a land line when you walked in the house.''

Inevitably, they'd start to imagine life without each other, but they'd be hesitant to break up. After all, they'd be locked into two-year contracts. (And the cellphone companies don't offer optional marital counseling along with insurance or extra chargers.)

So they'd stay together, for the sake of the plan. They'd call each other night and day, bickering, but at least their conversations would be ``in network calling.''