Former Alltel customers who made the switch to AT&T who may have noticed less coverage in some areas than they previously had can now have an explanation.

AT&T managing supervisor Mike Barger said that while the perception may be that AT&T’s service isn’t as good as what customers had with Alltel in places, that’s not accurate.

Since other service providers such as Verizon also operate off of a CDMA technology, Alltel was able to have an agreement to roam on their towers.

“With that, customers were looking on their phones and had coverage, but they were getting coverage off of a roaming partner’s tower,” he said. “Since AT&T operates on a different technology (GSM), hence the different phone, we don’t have the same agreement.”

Barger said they don’t have a GSM partner in this area.

“It’s all on us,” he said.

Nevertheless, Barger said AT&T is always working to improve its network.