What company was this?

May 10, 2018 7:34 AM

Back in the late 1990s, I lived in NYC and signed up for a landline plan through an alternative carrier. All I remember about them is that they billed themselves as green and good for the environment, and they would send monthly coupons for a pint of Ben and Jerry's. Trying to remember this is driving me and my old roommate up the wall. Does anyone remember this?
posted by Neely O'Hara to Grab Bag (12 answers total)

Best answer: Working Assets. It's CREDO now.
posted by wg at 7:35 AM on May 10, 2018 [9 favorites]

Best answer: Working Assets
posted by FencingGal at 7:35 AM on May 10, 2018 [4 favorites]

Response by poster: Wow, just one minute to get two correct answers! Thanks so much - I never would have remembered that.
posted by Neely O'Hara at 7:40 AM on May 10, 2018

Best answer: Oh man. I miss those monthly pints of B&Js.
posted by octothorpe at 7:46 AM on May 10, 2018 [6 favorites]

Any thoughts on how they are now? I also miss that Ben and Jerry's.
posted by mrfuga0 at 8:39 AM on May 10, 2018 [1 favorite]

Best answer: I used to have Working Assets/CREDO.

They stopped the Ben & Jerry's a long time ago. The other green/progressive things they did were:

* The bills were printed on recycled paper.
* They gave you a certain number of minutes per month to call your congressional representative on given issues. They would have a list of "action points" in their bills.
* They also had the option of letting you check a box that authorized them to send a postcard to Congress on your behalf in response to a given issue.
* Once a year, they donated a portion of their profits to a series of causes, and they let users vote on what cause they should donate to.


I ended up not really ever doing any of that, and only got it because the rates were decent. Then I got a VOIP system to save even more money and that was that.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:38 AM on May 10, 2018 [2 favorites]

IIRC, they also used to plant like 100 trees for every ton of paper they used printing those bills. (Gosh, '90s environmentalism, when personal consumer choices were going to solve global warming; how I miss its optimism (and mine).)
posted by Iris Gambol at 11:47 AM on May 10, 2018

Also, after the 2008 election, customers could apply to get a $100 grant from them to have a party. I did this, bought a bunch of food from a local deli, and celebrated with friends.
posted by FencingGal at 12:57 PM on May 10, 2018 [2 favorites]

I was with them for years for my mobile phone and in fact, my current phone number is the same one they gave me way back in 1998. I left because Verizon offered me mobile to mobile minutes and free long distance and since all my friends had cell phones or lived out of town, it made sense. I can still remember what the bills looked like and I always loved their business model.
posted by teleri025 at 1:25 PM on May 10, 2018

Working Assets still exists but I don't know if they are still taking new customers for their long distance service (as land lines continue to wither away, and long distance on mobile networks is basically free now).

They also offered a Visa credit card, but are definitely not taking any new applications for that. Existing customers continue to have and use their accounts though.
posted by intermod at 3:45 PM on May 10, 2018

Hahaha my parents used them and it was one of the many ways we were different from our very southern neighbors.
posted by masquesoporfavor at 3:08 PM on May 11, 2018

I'm still with Credo. They're still pretty good. Thanks to them I have never paid for a phone, but that's probably because I don't have to have the latest and greatest. I just got a free Galaxy 7 in return for another 2-year contract. I've been doing this since 2003.
posted by caryatid at 6:24 PM on May 14, 2018