Alltel Prepaid Plans

Part 2 - Airtime, Voicemail, Activation etc.

In part 2 of this review, we cover adding airtime, setting up voicemail and activating your phone. (Note again - this info was primarily gathered before they were bought out by Verizon and re-introduced as a regional provider.)

Add Minutes to your Phone

You can add minutes to your airtime balance in a number of ways: buy prepaid airtime cards at a retail location, add to your balance online or directly via the phone, or you can go to an Alltel retail dealer.

Buy Airtime Cards at a Retail Location

When Alltel was a national carrier, most big box stores like Walmart, Target etc., and even convenience stores and pharmacies carried airtime cards for Alltel phone. Now, they probably still do in the areas they now serve.

Online

My Prepaid

You used to be able to use their My Prepaid service to register your credit or debit card, check your balance and add airtime.

Nowadays, you can still add airtime online.

Via your Phone

You can add minutes to your prepaid phone directly once you set up the feature by registering your credit card or debit card with "MyPrepaid".

Bonus Minutes

You get bonus minutes every time you add to your airtime balance using a credit card via MyPrepaid.

Retail Locations

Alltel Retail locations have been converted to Verizon Wireless stores, but you can still go there add minutes. The only drawback, other than having to go there physically is that wasting your time checking out all the other phones and options, which is fun but you might come out of there with a lighter wallet.

Activation and Fees

The Alltel Activation fee is $25. You can activate your phone either online, at an Alltel retail location, or via (another) phone.

Alltel Activation Online

You can also activate your phone online for which you may get some bonus minutes which helps offset the activation fee.

Activation Fee

There is a $25 activation fee as mentioned earlier. You can get some of this back in two ways.

Instant Credit

When you order your phone online, you may get an Instant Credit rebate.

Bonus Minutes

In addition, when you also activate your phone online, you get additional bonus minutes which also help make up for the activation fee.

Service Period and other Usage Fees

Your service does not expire as long as you maintain your account balance, but there are usage fees.

Monthly usage fee

There is (or was) a $4 per month usage charge for the pay-per-minute plan. So every month $4 is deducted from your airtime balance. (Have to confirm whether this is still true.)

Daily usage fee

Every day your balance decreases by the amount of your daily usage fee.

Text Messaging

You can send text messages either by phone or email.

Sending an SMS phone to phone

When sending a message to a phone you naturally enter the telephone number you wish to send it to.

Sending an SMS to a phone via email

As this forum post says, to send a text message to an Alltel phone via email, you send it to:

phone#@message.alltel.com

where you enter the full nine digit phone number without any hyphens, spaces or brackets.

Voicemail

Basic voicemail is a standard feature on these prepaid plans. You are charged minutes while accessing your voicemail. Note: You have to set up your voicemail greeting within 60 days of activation, or your voice mailbox will be deleted.

Voicemail Instructions

There are two ways to get instructions for setting up your voicemail.

Via phone

You can dial #VML on your phone to hear instructions on how to set up your voicemail.

On the web

Go to this Alltel setup page (link gone) and on the lower left choose "Basic Voicemail", enter the first six digits of your Alltel Cell phone number, and click "Go" to receive your instructions. Thanks for reading this Alltel Prepaid review. If you've already tried this service, click Next to share it with the rest of us.

Previous - Plans and Coverage  Next - Video & User Reviews