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| | #1 |
| Fresh Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: NE Ohio Posts: 20
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I just got word of Alltel's new U Prepaid plan. Looks like it rocks! Same no-extra-charge-roaming coverage area as Simple Freedom but a lower per-minute rate! And the minutes don't expire!! Is there any way Alltel would let me change my Simple Freedom account to U Prepaid without loosing my Simple Freedom minutes, phone or number? My mom has the old Alltel prepaid (35 cents/min, no true roaming outside of the Alltel network, voice mail extra charge, etc.) Can this account be converted to U Prepaid without getting a new phone, number or having to pay an activation fee? |
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| | #2 | |
| Junior Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Michigan Posts: 228
Phone(s): Motorola E815 Provider(s): Alltel Thanks: 0
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| | Original Poster
#3 |
| Fresh Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: NE Ohio Posts: 20
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I called Alltel customer service today and switched my mom's account to U Prepaid and got the new 15 cents/min rate for her The Alltel rep I spoke with confirmed what you said about not being able to switch Simple Freedom to U Prepaid Is there some technical reason Alltel can't bring in Simple Freedom users? It seems to me as though it would be a simple switch in their billing system. Or is there more to it? A little bit off topic: The rep said that PRL updates are now automatically pushed to the phone and that dialing *228 is no longer necessary. Is this really true? |
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| | #4 | |
| Junior Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Michigan Posts: 228
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Concerning PRL updates--they are pushed out. However, it is done on a schedule and your phone has to be on and not on a call at the time. It is still a good idea to do a *228 every now and again. | |
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| | Original Poster
#5 |
| Fresh Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: NE Ohio Posts: 20
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I suppose I could also have my Simple Freedom number ported over to U Prepaid, if that's possible. Wouldn't Simple Freedom automatically release the ESN as part of the number porting process? I wonder if the $14.99 Kyocera phone they offer for the U Prepaid is as good as my Nokia 3587i. |
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| | #6 | |
| Junior Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Michigan Posts: 228
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Did you check to see if you can get into programming mode on the Nokia? To try enter *3001#12345# and then use 000000 (six zeros) for the service programming code. You won't hurt anything to look--just exit without changing anything. The service programming code may be something other than 000000. You would have been given it when you activated your phone. Last edited by music4praise; 02-06-2006 at 10:18 AM. | |
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| | Original Poster
#7 |
| Fresh Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: NE Ohio Posts: 20
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I tried *3001#12345# and tried to do something that requires the Service Programming Code. I tried 000000... "Code error" I also tried to do this before and think that I may have entered the wrong SPC too many time and may have locked myself out for good Some interesting developments... I can now see my call history (outbound calls only) at www.alltel.com and can dial *369 to check my balance just like U Prepaid. I can also see other account info that must have been ported over from Simple Freedom. |
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| | #8 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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Alltel cannot move your simple freedom number over to alltel prepaid. reason... simple freedom is owned by wal mart stores inc and alltep prepaid is owned by alltel. alltel and walmart have an agreement. walmart owns the company, alltel provides the numbers and switches. alltel oursources the customer service to sykes. hope this helps
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| | #9 | |
| Droid you're looking for Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Chili Town Posts: 6,707
Phone(s): a855, V3t, v620 Provider(s): Voicestream Wireless, Western Wireless Devices: Motorola S805, Motorola HS350, Apple MacBook Thanks: 3
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__________________ iDon't but Droid does. | |
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| | Original Poster
#10 |
| Fresh Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: NE Ohio Posts: 20
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Guess what... I went into a local (Brooklyn, OH) Alltel store today and got my Simple Freedom Nokia 3587i converted to U Prepaid!! The only real changes are that my calls are now 15 cents a minutes instead of 25 and text messages are 5 cents a piece instead of 8 and my minutes no longer have an expiration date (as long as I make 1 call every 30 days). I'm starting to wonder if Alltel is starting to phase out the Simple Freedom plan and replace it with U Prepaid. It would be great to start U Prepaid phones in Wal-Mart stores. There's absolutely no reason to go with Simple Freedom anymore. Has anyone else here been as lucky as me in getting their Simple Freedom phone painlessly changed over to U Prepaid? |
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| | #11 |
| Fresh Member Join Date: May 2006 Location: Upstate SC Posts: 23
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Wow.. that's different... our simple freedom numbers here are in a different billing system than the U prepaid numbers, and they do not transfer... we can't port numbers into prepaid at all because of the way our switch identifies prepay from postpay.. I'm glad that worked out for you...
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| | #12 | |
| Junior Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Michigan Posts: 228
Phone(s): Motorola E815 Provider(s): Alltel Thanks: 0
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| | #13 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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ouch that rep violated policy majorly.... yes the two services share the billing system but.. walmart owns simple freedom and alltel is not allowed to change their plans. you got lucky!!! but that rep will probably get spoken to.
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| | #14 | |
| Junior Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Michigan Posts: 228
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| | #15 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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Alltel owns the phone numbers and the switchs and lines the calls are routed to. They also brand their name on the boxes "powered by alltel". Wal-mart however owns the company. Their Customer service you talk to is not alltel at all. its a company walmart outsources called sykes. If there is a technical issue, since wal-mart does not have access to our systems, then simple freedom tech is contacted. this is the only contact alltel has with simple freedom. i worked in simple freedom for a long time. the idea of the alltel branding is that people would not be as trusting of walmart as a phone provider.
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| | #16 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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another thing i forgot to mention.... not too long ago system wise it would not have been possible for the rep to transfer. simple freedom used to use BCGI for billing. im sure you read about the law suit against that company. walmart wanted to prevent a shut down of bcgi impacting simple freedom and asked alltel to provide billing system as well as switches. since both set of pre pay numbers are now stored in the same system, numbers can be changed to alltel plans. alltel is not supposed to do this since 1. it would violate the agreement alltel has with walmart and 2. alltel does not make the money off the customer. basically, you will be paying in but the money is going to simple freedom since it is stored in the billing system as a simple freedom customer. again, no harm to you, it just should not have happened.
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| | Original Poster
#17 |
| Fresh Member Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: NE Ohio Posts: 20
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I too doubt that Wal*Mart owns Simple Freedom. The evidence, as music4tech pointed out, seems to indicate that Simple Freedom is a wholly owned subsidiary of Alltel. Alltel owns the simplefreedom.net domain. Since February, I have been able to pull up my call history on Alltel's website and have been able to get my airtime balance by dialing *369 on my handset instead of #2435 (#2435 no longer works- that must have been the old Simple Freedom billing/tracking system). Also, the message telling me how many minutes I have left and the text message reminder that my minutes are about to expire were eliminated around the same time. Also, I no longer have to double dial if my phone is talking to an Alltel tower but outside my home SID. I still have to double dial, however, in a Verizon area. The U Prepaid plan came out around the time the changes were made to Simple Freedom. I'm starting to wonder if Alltel has plans in the works to get rid of Simple Freedom and sell U Prepaid phones at Wal-Mart instead of Simple Freedom. The Simple Freedom Kyrocera SOHO KX1 phone is $59.99 at Wal*Mart and includes 120 minutes. The same phone is available with U Prepaid for 69.99 total ($14.99 for the phone, $35 activation, $20 for 133 minutes). For this phone, there is absolutely no reason to go with Simple Freedom instead of U Prepaid since U Prepaid minutes don't expire as long as you make 1 call every 30 days. |
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| | #18 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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I work for alltel and worked in simple freedom tech. i wish we did own simple freedom as a whole since it would have stopped the limitations we had. The reason for the coding is we started housing simple freedom in our billing system instead of the seperate one. however, these customers are still wal-mart pre-pay customers. do give you an idea of how this works... your local ford dealer sells ford cars but the dealership is privately owned even though there is ford branding everywhere. alltel gets paid a fee for providing the lines, switch access, billing now, and tech support. that is the reason it is still around with the u pre paid being released. alltel also maintains the IVR and the web site for wal-mart.
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| | #19 |
| Junior Member Join Date: Feb 2005 Location: Michigan Posts: 228
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Here are two direct quotes from Kevin T. Beebe taken from the May 3 Alltel earnings conference call transcript: "Our strong pre pay results were driven by the launch of U-Wireless, our new pre pay product introduced in January and the continued strength of Simple Freedom which is our phone in the box pre pay service sold primarily through Wal-Mart." "In addition, we’ve completed the conversion to a new pre pay service platform that expands pre pay features and substantially reduce our cost. Today both our U-Wireless and Simple Freedom products build on this new platform." Here is a link to the full transcript: http://seekingalpha.com/article/10009 I believe the limitations mentioned were due to a sales agreement with Walmart rather than Walmart ownership. Here is the BusinessWire article published when Simple Freedom was launched indicating an exclusive sales arrangement with Walmart. Walmart would naturally want a strict sales agreement to make it worth their while. http://www.businesswire.com/cgi-bin/...0200&ticker=AT Here is another relevant article: http://www.wirelessweek.com/article/...sc=Departments |
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| | #20 | |
| .:|Always Covered|:. Join Date: May 2005 Location: BVR Posts: 1,782
Phone(s): Blackberry 8230, KRZR K1m, SLVR L6, v710, E815, E816(ampd), LG 380, 8600 Provider(s): Alltel, T-Mobile, Sprint, Centennial Devices: Garmin eTrex Vista Cx, Bluetooth headset Thanks: 1
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Hey this is off topic, but do you know how I can access the programming menu on the SimpleFreedom Kyocera KX1 soho with the vertical screen? I was trying to just use that as the U prepaid account I opened, but as I was speaking to Alltel trying to change the info in the menu it was asking for a 6 digit security code. I bought it out of a box and never changed that security code, and it is not the default one, or any of the same numbers like 1,1,1,1,1,1, etc. I have also tried 1,2,3,4,5,6, and many others. But it still does let me into it. I called simplefreedom and they just gave me another alltel number, and the person from alltel u prepaid didn't know the code either. So i did shell out the 15 for a new phone. But I would like to resell the SF phone, which would be useless except for parts without access to the menu. Do you happen to know the code SF put in it? Or how I could just reset the whole thing? Thanks for any help you can give me! | |
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| | #21 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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whats the esn?? i still have access to walmart prepay and can get you the lock code
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| | #22 | |
| .:|Always Covered|:. Join Date: May 2005 Location: BVR Posts: 1,782
Phone(s): Blackberry 8230, KRZR K1m, SLVR L6, v710, E815, E816(ampd), LG 380, 8600 Provider(s): Alltel, T-Mobile, Sprint, Centennial Devices: Garmin eTrex Vista Cx, Bluetooth headset Thanks: 1
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| | #23 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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Lock Code: 610588
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| | #24 | |
| .:|Always Covered|:. Join Date: May 2005 Location: BVR Posts: 1,782
Phone(s): Blackberry 8230, KRZR K1m, SLVR L6, v710, E815, E816(ampd), LG 380, 8600 Provider(s): Alltel, T-Mobile, Sprint, Centennial Devices: Garmin eTrex Vista Cx, Bluetooth headset Thanks: 1
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| | #25 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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No problem. your not the first who wanted the lockcode. walmart callcenter won't give them out and we have to have them here at alltel for troubleshooting but only SF tech has them here in alltel
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| | #26 |
| I made my first post! Join Date: Jun 2006 Location: KY Posts: 1
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Hey, if i got the esn off this Nokia 6015i, could you get me the unlock code? Would greatly appreciate it. Thanks in advance for any help you can offer.
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| | #27 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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yes ill get you the code but guys don't make this a habbit. im getting a lot of pvt messages for esn unlock codes. .. maybe i should start charging |
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| | #28 | |
| I have arrived! Join Date: Jun 2006 Posts: 2
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Can you help me with this esn please 03312374898 | |
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| | #29 |
| Join Date: Apr 2006 Location: Arkansas Posts: 451
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check your private messages i gave you the lock code.
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| | #30 |
| I have arrived! Join Date: Jun 2006 Posts: 2
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Thank you !!
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| Thread | Thread Starter | Forum | Replies | Last Post |
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