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Verizon no longer accepts activations of old Alltel phones

Posted: , by Nick T.

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Verizon no longer accepts activations of old Alltel phones
Effective today, Verizon will no longer activate legacy Alltel phones on its network. Or in other words, in case you still have an old Alltel device idly collecting dust in some drawer, it has just been rendered useless. Alltel handsets that are active will not be affected in any way, yet Verizon politely reminds you that it has much flashier phones on its shelves now. 

The announcement comes three years after Verizon purchased Alltel for over $28 billion, thus becoming the largest wireless carrier in the U.S. Alltel was not doing well at that time having accumulated debts of over $22 billion, so a buyout from Verizon was more than welcome for the company.

So, if you happen to be among the 27 people stuck with an unusable Alltel phone, please, do the planet a favor and try to get it recycled. You might even make a few bucks along the way, you know, not to mention the the warm feeling that you will get from your good deed.

Below is the official statement from Verizon:

Effective today, legacy Alltel devices can no longer be activated on our network. So, if you had an Alltel device sitting in a drawer or glove compartment and wanted to activate it today, you would not be able to. Today's change does not affect legacy Alltel devices that are currently activated and on our network.

It has been three years since Verizon Wireless purchased Alltel and to give customers the best experience on our network, we are encouraging them to move to current devices. Customers who are told they cannot activate an older Alltel device are able to take advantage of any current promotions, including free devices as offered on our Web site. 

source: Verizon via Engadget

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1. Joshing4fun posted on 17 Jan 2012, 06:21 1 1

How is Alltel even around anymore? Just saw a commercial for them even though they don't even exist anymore.

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2. Knicknevin posted on 17 Jan 2012, 07:21 2

Of course you are going to see commercials for them when your watching your taped movies and re-runs! hehe j/k.

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6. rejoicefulone posted on 17 Jan 2012, 11:44

Alltel is still in existance. They have approx. 800,000 customers that could not be absorbed into Verizon or at&t. I pasted information from their website.
About Us
Allied Wireless Communications Corporation (AWCC) is a wireless telecommunications provider based in Little Rock, Arkansas. The company serves subscribers in six states – Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, Illinois, Ohio and Idaho.

AWCC is a subsidiary of Atlantic Tele-Network, Inc. (NASDAQ: ATNI), a Massachusetts based telecommunications company operating advanced wireless, wireline, and both terrestrial and submarine fiber optic networks in North America and the Caribbean.

AWCC was formed in connection with ATN's agreement to purchase wireless properties, licenses and network assets from Verizon Wireless in early 2010. Verizon was required by the Federal Communications Commission to sell these coverage areas.

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3. palmguy posted on 17 Jan 2012, 07:30

Franchise stores. There's one in my city.

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4. silver0681 posted on 17 Jan 2012, 08:15 1

It's simple joshing when big red bought them out they were not allowed to buy all altell markets due to monopolistic reasons. A different company bought them out bought the rights to the altell named and continued the operation in small markets

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5. EclipseGSX posted on 17 Jan 2012, 10:48 2

Chad from Alltel was awesome, too bad

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7. nickjjay posted on 17 Jan 2012, 17:07

This is actually a pretty big deal in some rural areas where alltel customers are the majority.

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8. atheisticemetic posted on 18 Jan 2012, 09:03

welp time to customers to dust off that old V3 razr and actually recycle it :)

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9. atheisticemetic posted on 18 Jan 2012, 09:36

"Alltel was not doing well at that time having accumulated debts of over $22 billion, so a buyout from Verizon was more than welcome for the company."

that's when happens when you offer a bajillion free friends to call along with all the other hand outs they gave. (if i'm a library and gave out tons of books with no late fees how would you expect to survive?).

I know i'll get thumbs down for this but good riddance of a poorly run company that intentionally built itself up to be consumed by Verizon Wireless. what a scam

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