Alltel Wireless to offer one-year contracts

Alltel Wireless has announced that starting June 5, it will bring back one-year service contracts for all of Alltel's new and renewing customers.

Though one-year contracts aren't new, most of the cell phone industry uses two-year service agreements for new contracts. Even if your carrier does offer one-year contracts, your new phone will likely cost less with a two-year agreement. Not so with Alltel. In fact, it says it will be the only carrier to offer the same handset pricing as you would get with a two-year contract, but with one-year agreements instead.

However, this one-year contract option is only available to customers in the 91 cellular market areas that Verizon is required to divest--some of which are being acquired by AT&T pending approval. So you might want to check with Alltel to see if you're in one of those areas.