Alltel customers in divested markets had plenty of cause to be jealous of their Verizon-owned brothers and sisters last month when Big Red launched the BlackBerry Tour 9630. Well, Alltel fans, it’s time to turn that frown upside down — Alltel has just announced the availability of RIM’s latest CDMA handset. The Tour is available immediately in Alltel stores and online for $199 on a 1-year contract after a $100 mail-in rebate. Gotta love that 2-year price on a 1-year contract. You will be required to select a Smart Choice plan, running $69.99 and up, and the Tour is compatible with Alltel’s famous My Circle calling feature. So, divested boys and girls, are you psyched that you can finally get your hands on the Tour or have you already moved on to daydreaming about the Storm 2?

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Following a tumultuous start, it looks like Sprint’s troubles with stocking and delivering BlackBerry Tour units are almost over. A series of three posts from Sprint’s twitter account suggest two shipments from RIM should allow the carrier to catch up with “strong demand”. One shipment apparently arrived this week and a second is scheduled for delivery early next week. Those who still haven’t been able to get their hands on RIM’s latest handset will hopefully accept Sprint’s apologies and sit tight for just a short while longer. We’re still not sure why the Tour was listed as in stock earlier this week when customers received backorder notices immediately after placing orders, but our guess is we’ll never know exactly what went wrong. The bottom line is these two Tour shipments should take care of everyone still waiting to snag a unit.

Why can’t Sprint launch a handset? That’s the question countless subscribers are asking themselves as the release of the BlackBerry Tour 9630 continues to look more and more like a paper launch. A fair number of people who ordered the handset have received it by now and many were able to snag a unit at retail locations, but it seems that for every happy new Tour owner there are three enraged subscribers looking for answers. At this point, you can’t find a Sprint or BlackBerry forum without reading post after post from people fuming over the bungled Tour launch. Since July 12th, the official launch date, we’ve also received countless emails from Sprint subscribers venting their frustrations and recounting various horror stories. The consensus among them: Sprint can’t launch a handset to save its life — or business, as it were.

Beyond a few emails we have from people who got their Tours at retail locations and couldn’t activate them, the biggest problem being reported is a seeming lack of candor with regard to inventory. We have tons of emails from people who ordered the Tour within the first hour of online availability — within the first 15-30 minutes even. Despite the website showing the handset as being in stock and ready to roll, they received a backorder notice immediately after ordering. Here is an example of an email received by a Sprint customer shortly after submitting his order online about a half hour after the Tour went live on Sprint’s site:

Product ID: SP9630RIM Description: Blackberry Tour 9630 Qty: 1 Order Date: 2009-07-12

Status: Your order or a portion of your order is in backorder status. If you would like to select an alternate product or cancel your backordered item, please call 866-789-8292 between 8:00 a.m. EST to 11:00 p.m. EST Monday to Friday or 9:00 a.m. EST to 9:00 p.m. EST on Saturdays and Sundays.Please note that cancellation requests may not always process successfully due the speed of warehouse processing. If you cancelled your backordered item but still received a shipment, please refuse the shipment or call us to process a return within 30 days of receipt.

Why is it that Sprint just can’t seem to stock a handset — and perhaps more importantly, why was the handset listed as being available if in fact it was not? It has gotten to the point where the carrier even confirmed to us ahead time that the Palm Pre launch would be a mess. Fast forward to the Tour, Sprint’s next flagship handset, and we’re seeing the exact same mistakes all over again. We understand it was a big deal for Sprint to finally get a hot new BlackBerry out to market at the same time as Verizon. Great. Golf claps. If doing so simply means the carrier is going to have to snub half of the people who want to buy the handset however, we have to think waiting for shipments would have been the wiser move. In fact, we’ve received several comments from people who decided to switch to Verizon for the Tour because of this mess. If you’ve looked at Sprint’s numbers over the past couple of years, you know the last thing the struggling carrier needs to be doing right now is giving subscribers another reason to jump ship.

Of course Sprint isn’t the only carrier plagued with launch issues, it just happens to be more in need of smooth sailing than any other at this point. Trust us — we want nothing more than to witness and report on a great and successful launch at Sprint. The company has made plenty of good moves of late in an effort to strengthen its network and focus on better customer service training. It shows, it really does, but it’s all for naught if Sprint continues to stumble where top-level strategy and execution are concerned.

Following our post yesterday and the ensuing outcry, it looks like Verizon had a change of heart where BlackBerry Tour pre-orders are concerned. Are you a current Verizon Wireless subscriber whose spirits were crushed upon learning that pre-orders were only open to new customers? Fret not, future Tour addicts, as Verizon’s site is singing a different tune this morning. From the 9630 product page:

Existing customers will be able to upgrade or purchase the BlackBerry Tour on this site very soon. Please check back with us tomorrow.

Solid.

Thanks, Ben!

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Still wondering why we steered clear of that July 20th rumor? Sprint has made it official folks, the BlackBerry Tour will be launching with Sprint on Sunday, July 12th. Pricing lines up with Verizon at $199.99 after instant rebate but there will be a mail-in rebate of some kind to deal with. More info as it comes in — Sprint still hasn’t issued an official press release.

Thanks, Ricky Ricardo Mentelban!

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Next in line to get scooped on this fine Thursday afternoon? How about a little BlackBerry Tour 9630 love for all you RIM addicts out there? Over the past few weeks we’ve been getting some pretty consistant feedback from various ninjas putting the highly anticipated BlackBerry Tour 9630 on the streets either Wednesday July 15th or Friday July 17th. We’ve been waiting for some more confirmation before running a post but now, thanks to a few email tips, we see that insider kevin byrne from HoFo has placed the launch date on Monday July 13th. Byrne has a good track record and at the very least, he’s always in the right ball park. Judging by our intel at this point we’re leaning more towards the 17th but it’s now a pretty safe bet that one of these three dates is the winner. Sure it’s not as early as BlackBerry-addicted Verizon customers would have liked, but at least now you can gear up for what will definitely be a hot Summer week in July.