Unlimited Minutes & Unlimited Text for $22.50/month in Alltel AreasUsing Google Voice

1. Sign up for Alltel $0.75/day prepaid.

2. Choose "Unlimited to Favorite Number (1 Number)" and "Unlimited Text
Messaging" as your "Free Pay-Per-Day Feature Choices"

3. Sign up for Google Voice (available soon, in the mean time you can
use MyGlobalTalk or VoiceStick and pay a small amount per minute).

4. Set your "Favorite Number" on Alltel to your Google Voice number.

5. Forward your calls from your Google Voice number (your Alltel
"Favorite Number") to your Alltel cellular number.

6. Give out your Google Voice number as your cellular number.

Free incoming: Calls forwarded to your Alltel number from your Google
Voice number are free because your Google Voice number is your Alltel
"Favorite Number."

Free outgoing: Call your "Favorite Number" (your Google Voice number)
and place calls through Google Voice.

Get this fast before Verizon destroys Alltel's prepaid plans.

You can't sign up for Alltel plans unless you have a credit card with a
billing address in the Alltel service area.

SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote:

> Get this fast before Verizon destroys Alltel's prepaid plans.

There's no guarantee that any Alltel plans will survive more than
temporarily.

Since prepaid plans do not promise the customer the ability to renew
they could be changed at any time, couldn't they?

XS11E wrote:
> SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote:
>
>> Get this fast before Verizon destroys Alltel's prepaid plans.
>
> There's no guarantee that any Alltel plans will survive more than
> temporarily.
>
> Since prepaid plans do not promise the customer the ability to renew
> they could be changed at any time, couldn't they?

They could, but they probably will grandfather people in. They don't
have to keep letting me be on a 10 year old plan that's costing me less
than $30/month and that still has 8:01 p.m. off peak, but they don't
seem to be in any hurry to force me to get a current plan.

At 28 Jun 2009 12:35:16 -0700 SMS wrote:
> 1. Sign up for Alltel $0.75/day prepaid.
>
> 2. Choose "Unlimited to Favorite Number (1 Number)" and "Unlimited Text
> Messaging" as your "Free Pay-Per-Day Feature Choices"
>
> 3. Sign up for Google Voice (available soon, in the mean time you can use
> MyGlobalTalk or VoiceStick and pay a small amount per minute).
>
> 4. Set your "Favorite Number" on Alltel to your Google Voice number.
>
> 5. Forward your calls from your Google Voice number (your Alltel
> "Favorite Number") to your Alltel cellular number.
>
> 6. Give out your Google Voice number as your cellular number.
>
> Free incoming: Calls forwarded to your Alltel number from your Google
> Voice number are free because your Google Voice number is your Alltel
> "Favorite Number."
>
> Free outgoing: Call your "Favorite Number" (your Google Voice number) and
> place calls through Google Voice.
>
> Get this fast before Verizon destroys Alltel's prepaid plans.
>
> You can't sign up for Alltel plans unless you have a credit card with a
> billing address in the Alltel service area.

You can do it on T-Mobile as well, albeit more expensively, with a MyFaves
plan ($39.99/month.)

The two biggest problems with it:

1) You lose caller ID. Every call you receive will display the same CID,
your Google Voice number since you have to set Google Voice to display the
GV number as the CID to "fool" the cellco into thinking it's a free
incoming call from a favorite number.

2) Outgong calls are low quality. Unless Google has improved on the Grand
Central infastructure, outgoing calls initiated through GC had huge latency
delays fom the "double VoIP" nature of the call- you to GV and GV to your
intended call recipient. I felt like Neil Armstrong calling from the Moon.
(Or if you're Larry, like Neil Armstrong calling via tape delay from the
abandoned Lunar surface set of Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey.")

....and I'll add a less important third problem: I don't know about Alltel,
but with T-Mo, such trickery is a ToS violation of their MyFaves plans!

At 28 Jun 2009 15:40:09 -0700 XS11E wrote:
> SMS <scharf.steven@geemail.com> wrote:
>
> > Get this fast before Verizon destroys Alltel's prepaid plans.
>
> There's no guarantee that any Alltel plans will survive more than
> temporarily.
>
> Since prepaid plans do not promise the customer the ability to renew
> they could be changed at any time, couldn't they?

Technically yes, but it's rare that anyone is forced off their old prepaid
plan. Frankly there's never been a prepaid plan with such a good value it
was actually a liability for the carrier, so why P.O. a customer who has a
"better" plan than you currently offer, and potentially drive him to a
competitor out of spite?

Todd Allcock <elecconnec@aNOoSPAMl.com> wrote:

> At 28 Jun 2009 15:40:09 -0700 XS11E wrote:
>> Since prepaid plans do not promise the customer the ability to
>> renew they could be changed at any time, couldn't they?
>
> Technically yes, but it's rare that anyone is forced off their old
> prepaid plan. Frankly there's never been a prepaid plan with such
> a good value it was actually a liability for the carrier, so why
> P.O. a customer who has a "better" plan than you currently offer,
> and potentially drive him to a competitor out of spite?

Let's consider New Mexico, OK? Apparently the divestiture has given
all of Alltel's New Mexico to AT&T. So what will an Alltel customer
with a CDMA phone do on a GSM network? What will AT&T do? Allow
Alltel phones to roam on VZW?

Rumors are flying around that they'll be forced to buy new phones, that
can't possibly be true can it? But who would have thought they'd fire
Chad?

http://www.forbes.com/2009/06/26/lay...nt-leadership-
report.html

Watch the line wrap...

At 29 Jun 2009 00:10:43 -0700 XS11E wrote:

> >> Since prepaid plans do not promise the customer the ability to
> >> renew they could be changed at any time, couldn't they?
> >
> > Technically yes, but it's rare that anyone is forced off their old
> > prepaid plan. Frankly there's never been a prepaid plan with such
> > a good value it was actually a liability for the carrier, so why
> > P.O. a customer who has a "better" plan than you currently offer,
> > and potentially drive him to a competitor out of spite?
>
> Let's consider New Mexico, OK? Apparently the divestiture has given
> all of Alltel's New Mexico to AT&T. So what will an Alltel customer
> with a CDMA phone do on a GSM network? What will AT&T do? Allow
> Alltel phones to roam on VZW?


Good question- they might offer to honor the plans on AT&T equipment.
When I was an SBMS (eventually Cingular) dealerin Kansas City in the TDMA-
days of the late 90s, SBMS bouht out a rural CDMA carrier and we received
about 20 pages of instruction on how to deal with the "purchased"
customers. All non-equivalent rate plans were adopted/grandfathered (but
where SBMS' plans were "better"; for example, more minutes for less money,
customers were migrated. As to equipment, there were proceedures to trade
"equivalent" equipment for no charge (with contract extension) and a
"customer complaint" process to handle customers not satisfied with SBMS'
definition of equivalent on a case-by-cae basis.

This isn't 100% analogous to today, of course, since CDMA and TDMA handsets
could both fall-back to analog, so customers, while encouraged to swap,
weren't required to (at least in the short-term- I think SBMS gave them a
year, maybe two.) I also don't specifically recall how we handled prepaid-
it was far less prevalent in those days of $200 prepaid phones and
$0.95/minute prepaid rates. (I was far enough from the "border" that I
never dealt with any conversions personally, but all dealers received the
rules and proceedures as an FYI.)

> Rumors are flying around that they'll be forced to buy new phones, that
> can't possibly be true can it? But who would have thought they'd fire
> Chad?
>
> <http://www.forbes.com/2009/06/26/lay...nt-leadership-
report.html>
>
> Watch the line wrap...


I doubt AT&T would force new handset purchases since that would certainly
drive many to competitors out of spite. AT&T needs to win their new
customers hearts and minds- loyal customers aren't won by FCC decree!