MXPA97003668A - System and method for fixing prices of telecommunication transactions - Google Patents

Abstract

A system is described to quote and bill telecommunication transactions in real time. In a preferred embodiment, a Real-Time Analysis Machine (RAE-Real-Time Analysis Machine) updates customer accounts in real time, applying customer-specific data to Automatic Message Accounting (AMA) records. . In a typical update, a customer initiates a call to which a route is assigned through a switch in a telephone network. The switch generates an AMA record for the call, and the record is passed to the RAE where the call is quoted. Then the RAE assigns the call to the client that initiated the call, places that quote data of the client, and applies to the call any discounts to which the client is entitled. After the call has been quoted and discounted or "fixed price", it can be added to the other calls with the customer's fixed price for the current billing period, to generate a current account for the client

Description

SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR FIXING PRICES OF TELECOMMUNICATIONS TRANSACTIONS FIELD OF THE INVENTION. This invention relates to communication networks and, more particularly, to a system and method for setting prices of telecommunications transactions that are performed on a communications network.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION. The use of automatic accounting systems for the price of telephone calls is well known in the art of communication networks. In a typical automatic accounting system, when a call is dialed for the first time, the control team in the originating office determines whether the call can be billed (i.e., not covered by a monthly quote). If the call can be billed, an accounting record is created for the purpose of recording: the call telephone number; the number of the receiving telephone; the time the call was answered; and the time when the call was terminated. The information in the accounting record can then be used to "quote" the call. The price of the call refers to REF: 24254 - - process by which the charge for the call is determined. Involves: (1) calculating the distance between the call offices and the defendant; and (2) apply the appropriate rate - based on the calculated distance, the date on which the call was made, the time of the day on which the call was made, and the duration of the call. The quote is not specific to the customer and is done in a conventional manner in batches. It must be distinguished from billing, which is specific to the customer. In addition, although invoicing is conventionally done in batches, such as quotation, batch times for billing and quotation are usually different. Billing is the process of adding the customer's quoted calls over a period of time to determine the customer's account for the period. Typically, the period is one month and the sum gives the customer's monthly telephone bill. An architecture commonly used to generate customer accounts is shown in Figure 1. Referring to Figure 1, a call telephone 102, a demanded telephone 104, a telephone network switch 106, and a Database are shown. of the Details of the Call (CDD -Cali Detail Datábase) 108. A record of the Automatic Message Accounting (AMA -Automatic Message Accounting), represented by the block 110 is also shown. As indicated in the figure, a call billable can be initiated on the telephone 102 and assigned route through the switch 106, eg, a switch of the American Telephone & Telegraph Co., Inc. (AT & T) 4ESS, to the telephone 104. The switch generates the AMA 110 register, which includes the information necessary to quote the call. The AMA record is passed to the CDD where it is stored until the end of the customer's billing period. At the end of the billing period, the AMA 110 record, and all other AMA records generated for the customer, are retrieved from the CDD and used to calculate the customer's account. One way to generate a customer's account is to simply calculate a charge for each AMA record stored in the CDD and then add the charges. However, generating an account usually involves more than a lump sum. Modifications to the total may be necessary. Typically, modifications to the total are necessary due to the vagueness of the quotation system to apply a general quote to each call, without taking into consideration if any customer subscribes to a service or billing plan. For example, customers who subscribe to plans, such as AT &T True USA, may be entitled to discounts on some or all of their calls; however, a general quote, which is not taken into account for the plan (s), is applied to all quotable customer calls. Therefore, at the end of the billing period, modifications must be made to the client's total account to reflect the appropriate discount (s). After the account is modified to reflect the discount (s), it is sent to the user for payment.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION It has been recognized that, because current billing systems can not provide quotation records incorporating the necessary modifications to reflect a particular billing plan, these procedures are necessarily postponed until the end of the billing period. As things stand, certain types of billing options can not be implemented. However, in the competitive market of the telecommunications service, it is advantageous for the service provider to offer as many billing alternatives as possible. Therefore, in accordance with the present invention, a system has been developed that is capable of processing the arrival accounting records, on a real-time basis, so as to reflect the billing services to which a particular customer can subscribe. .

- - In a preferred embodiment of the invention, a Real-Time Analysis Machine (RAE-Real-Time Analysis Engine) updates customer accounts in real-time, applying customer-specific data to the accounting records. In a typical update, a customer initiates a call that has routing assignment through a switch of the originating telephone network. The switch generates an accounting record for the call and the record is passed to the RAE, where the call is quoted. The RAE then assigns the quoted call to a customer, locates the data of the account of that client and applies any specific discount of the client to the quoted call. The process of quotation and discount of a call is called "set the price of the call", and the result of the price setting process is called "value of the call with fixed price". Once the value of a call with fixed price is generated, for the customer's call, it can be added to other call values with a fixed price for the client, to produce a current account for the client. Because the server makes the real-time price of the call, the client's current account can be kept up-to-date on a real-time basis. Preferably, the client's current account is stored in a Summary Database (SD-Summary Database) within the RAE, and the values of the call with fixed price are stored in the CDD.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES Figure 1 is a block diagram of a previous telephone billing system. Figure 2 is a block diagram of a telephone call billing system, according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention. Figure 3 is a block diagram of an alternative telephone call billing system, in accordance with the present invention. Figure 4 is a block diagram of a second alternative system for billing telephone calls, according to the present invention. Figure 5 is a flow chart showing the steps involved in generating the prices of the real-time call and the user's real-time balances, in accordance with the present invention. Figure 6 is a block diagram of a telephone call billing system, according to the present invention, in which calls can be assigned to a route based on real-time pricing information. Figure 7 is a block diagram of an alternative telephone billing system, according to the present invention, in which calls can be assigned to route based on real-time pricing information. Figure 8 is a block diagram of a second alternative telephone billing system, according to the present invention, in which calls can be assigned to a route based on real-time pricing information.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION Referring to Figure 2, a block diagram of a telephone system according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention is shown. As can be seen from the Figure, a call can be initiated on a first telephone 202 and directed to a second telephone 204. The call is assigned to a route through a switch on the network 206 that generates an AMA register 210 for the call and passes the AMA register to a CDD 208. It should be noted here that there is an abundance of protocols and transmission media that can be used to pass the data from the switch to the CDD. For example, suitable protocols include the well-known File Transfer Protocol (FTP) and the Transmission Control Protocol / Internet Protocol; and suitable transmission means include shielded braided wire pairs, fiber optic lines, coaxial cable and wired links. In addition, these protocols and means are suitable for use in all transfers and data queries described below. In any case, once the AMA record has been passed to the CDD, it is available for use in setting the price of the call. For this purpose, the AMA record is passed to a Real Time Announcement Machine (RAE) 212, which may be a general-purpose computer capable of running the software necessary to implement the invention. The RAE applies any customer-specific billing parameters to the AMA record to produce a processed AMA record. Then both the AMA record and the AMA record processed back to the CDD pass, for storage. The method of passing the data back to the CDD is described in the commonly assigned co-pending US Patent Application Serial No. 08 / 607,983 entitled "Compression and Buffering of a Stream with Data Extraction Requirements", where this application is incorporated here as a reference The RAE performs its functions at the moment in which the switch passes the AMA register to the CDD (i.e., it makes the fixing of the call price in real time). In order to achieve real-time processing of AMA records, the invention must solve two main obstacles. First, customer-specific data is fragmented across multiple business units, without any cohesive notion of an integrated customer profile. This situation is shown in Figure 2, which shows various databases, 214, 216 and 218, of the customer profile. As shown in the Figure, the invention solves this obstacle through the use of an integrated database of the customer profile, located within the RAE. The software tools update the integrated database of the customer profile in response to the updates of the individual customer profiles, 214, 216 and 218, so that the integrated database always contains current information about all users. The second obstacle to real-time price fixing of telephone calls is the total volume of the customer and the data of the telephone call. The volume makes it difficult to store, quote and query call data in real time. To overcome this obstacle, the invention accumulates summary information as each individual call record (AMA) is received and quoted in real time. It is generally desirable, for a telephone network, to maintain a customer's current account. Accordingly, one type of accumulated summary information may be current accounts for each customer in the network. However, it may be useful to accumulate other types of summary information for particular clients. The nature of the accumulated summary information for a particular client depends on the services subscribed by that client. For example, a customer can subscribe to a plan in which calls made during the hours between 5:00 p.m. and 9:00 p.m. receive a 10% discount; in which case it is useful to keep a summary field that contains the number of minutes of the calls that the customer has made during the discount period. It can also be useful to accumulate summary information among clients. For example, it may be desirable, for marketing purposes, to know the total expense of the customers in a particular plan for a given billing period. In this case, the prices of all the calls made under the plan in question, without taking into account the customer, can be added to the given contribution period, to provide a total current expenditure in the plan. In any case, the summary information is stored in a Summary Database (SD -Summary Datábase) 213, which is located within the RAE. Accordingly, in the preferred embodiment, the AMA registers and the processed AMA registers are stored in the CDD, while the summary information is stored in the SD. However, it should be noted that many alternative storage schemes can be employed, without departing from the spirit of the invention. For example, in an alternative scheme the AMA records are stored in the CDD; the summary information is stored in the SD; and processed AMA records are stored in the CDD and the SD. There are many applications in which the call price setting data, provided by the present invention, can be used. These include those situations in which a person rents telephone equipment or services and must pay for the use of the equipment or service at the end of the rental period. The present invention allows the leasing company to invoice the use, without adding any hardware or software in the rental equipment. All that is required is for the leasing company to have access to the data provided by the present invention. One way to provide this access is to allow the leasing company to consult the SD, and / or CDD, directly through a network connection. An example of a leasing application for the present invention involves including cell phones in rental cars. The car leasing company can bill for the inclusion of the cell phone based on the landlord's use. This is done by resetting the cell phone account at the time of the lease and placing a query to the network that serves the phone at the time it is returned. The balance of the cell phone account - which is kept current in accordance with the present invention - is simply added to the client's lease account. As an option, the leasing client can be informed with a detailed account that includes the price of each call made during the lease period. Referring now to Figure 3, a preferred, alternative embodiment of a telephone system according to the present invention is shown. As shown in the Figure, a call can be initiated on a first telephone 302 and directed to a second telephone 304. The call is assigned to a route by a switch on the network 306, which generates an AMA 310 register for the call . The AMA record is passed to an RAE 312, which applies client-specific parameters to the AMA record to produce a processed AMA record. The AMA record and the processed AMA record are then passed to a CDD 308 for storage. Like the RAE in Figure 2, the RAE in Figure 3 includes an SD 313. The RAE in Figure 3 also includes an integrated customer profile - although it should be noted that for simplicity of presentation, the profile databases of the individual customer are not shown in Figure 3, nor in the Figures that follow. Also, like the RAE of Figure 2, the RAE of Figure 3 accumulates summary information as each individual call record is received and quoted in real time, the summary information is stored in SD 313. As in the In the case of the modality described above, alternative schemes may be used for the storage of AMA records, processed AMA records and summary information. Figure 4 shows another preferred embodiment of a telephone system, according to the present invention. In the embodiment of Figure 4, as in the previous modalities, a call initiated on a first telephone 402 can be directed to a second telephone 404, through a network switch 406, which generates an AMA 410 register. However, in the modality of Figure 4, the AMA registry is passed to a Complex of Quotation (RC -Rating Complex) 412. The RC is a unit that performs the functions of the CDD and the RAE, and can therefore be characterized as a combined CDD and RAE. As shown in the figure, the RC may include an SD, 413, for the storage of the summary information separated from the AMA registers and the AMA registers processed. As in the modalities described above, alternative schemes may be used for the storage of the AMA records, the processed AMA records and the summary information. It should be noted that, although the three modalities discussed above show a call that starts from a first telephone and goes to a second telephone, it is possible that calls can be initiated by, and addressed to, many different types of communication devices. For example, a call can be initiated by a fax machine and directed to a personal computer. In addition, a call can be initiated by a single communication device and address multiple communication devices. For example, a call can be initiated by a fax machine and directed to multiple independent personal computers. For purposes of this description, each case of a single initial call that is directed to a different terminating device will be considered an independent call. Figure 5 shows, in the form of a flow chart, a procedure that can be used by an RAE to perform real-time processing of the AMA records for a customer and maintain a current account for the customer. In the following description of the flow diagram, reference will be made to the modality shown in Figure 2. After receiving an AMA record of the CDD 208, the RAE 212 of the first stage takes it to quote the call (step 302) . Then you must assign the quoted call to the client (step 304) so that client-specific parameters can be applied to the call. Several well-known techniques can be used to assign the quoted call to the client. One of these techniques uses Automatic Number Identification (ANI -Automatic Number Identification). In an ANI system, the number of the telephone station from which the call is initiated is determined and used to identify the party that initiated the call. Accordingly, in the embodiment of Figure 2, the telephone number 202 can be determined and passed to the RAE, along with the AMA record. The RAE can then cross-reference the number with the customer profile, which contains the customer-specific data that will be used for the current call. Once the appropriate profile has been determined, the RAE applies the customer-specific data to the quoted call to produce a value of the call with fixed price (step 306). The value of the call with fixed price can be added to the customer's previous account to create a new account or "checking account" (step 308). Finally, the value of the fixed price call (processed AMA register) is stored in the CDD and the current account (summary information) is stored in the SD (step 312). As described in relation to Figure 2, an alternative scheme is to store the value of the call with fixed price and the current account - collectively referred to as "the call data with fixed price" - in the SD; in which case step 312 would involve storing the value of the call with fixed price and the current account in the SD. As an additional step in the procedure of Figure 5, the RAE may adjust charges for previous calls, to reflect certain types of billing plans (step 310). For example, a customer can subscribe to a plan in which the customer receives a conditional 10% discount on all calls, with the condition that the customer exceeds $ 100.00 in the total charges for a given billing period. In such a case, calls will initially be billed at the total quote, until the time the customer reaches $ 100.00 of total charges. Therefore, if the customer reaches $ 100.00 before the end of the billing period, not only will successive calls need to be reduced by 10%, but all previous calls will need to be reduced by 10%. This requires that the prices generated for the previous calls be adjusted retroactively. The data of the fixed price call provided through the RAE can be used as a basis for making call route assignment decisions. One modality capable of performing this function is the one shown in Figure 6. Figure 6 is the same as Figure 2 with two exceptions: (1) the omission of the databases of the individual customer profile and (2) adding a data link 614. As shown in the Figure, a call can be initiated on a telephone 602 and assigned to route to a telephone 604 through a network switch 606. The switch generates an AMA 610 register which is passed to a CDD 608 and then continue to an RAE 612 for processing. As described above, the RAE can use the AMA registers to generate call data with a fixed price in the form of fixed call and current account values. This data of the call with fixed price can be stored in the SD 613. As part of the route assignment process of a call, the switch 606 can consult in the RAE some or all the data of the call with fixed price via the link of the call. data 614. In this way, the data returned in response to the query can be used by the network and / or the client to decide how the route will be assigned to the call. A method that can be used to query the RAE is described in the commonly assigned, co-pending US patent application, Series No. 08 / 446,170 - entitled "Method for Querying Incrementally Maintained Databases" - the application of which is incorporated herein by reference. An illustrative case in which the call is assigned a route based on the data of the call with fixed price is described below, with reference to Figure 6. As part of a car rental agreement, to a customer You are provided with a cell phone. The customer is not charged for the cell phone based on usage, however, the client must not exceed a predetermined use concession during the rental period. The amount of use concession used by the client is maintained as summary information by the RAE. When the customer initiates a call from the cellular phone (represented by the telephone 602), the switch 606, which may be the switch of the originating office, consults the RAE, via the data link 614, to determine if the client it has, or not, enough remaining concession to complete the call to the desired termination station (represented by telephone 604). If the client does not have a remaining sufficient concession, the switch 606 does not assign a route to the call to the telephone 604; rather, it takes an alternative action, such as allowing the customer to dial an alternate number. As an additional feature, the network can initiate an announcement to the customer, via a voice response unit, informing the client that they do not have enough concession to cover the desired call and that the customer can dial an alternative number. Many variations are possible in the rent case described above. For example, after the beginning of a call by the client that rents, a query can be generated and an indication that the client has exceeded its concession can be returned. However, instead of simply preventing the customer from making the call, the customer can be notified that their account has been exceeded and can be given the option to continue with an additional cost. In addition, there are many alternative possible modalities of the system of Figure 6, each of which are capable of using call data with fixed, real-time price to assign route to calls. One of these alternative modalities is carried out by making a small modification to the modality shown in Figure 6. Instead of providing a data link from the switch to the RAE, a two-way data link can be provided, 616 , between the switch and the CDD. Therefore, queries from the switch can be made directly to the CDD, and the CDD can pass the desired data back to the switch. Of course, in this modality it is necessary that the desired data are present in the CDD. In this regard, the system can be adjusted in such a way that the RAE passes all the desired possible data, e.g., current accounts, back to the CDD, when it performs its real-time pricing calculations. Additional modalities capable of using the real-time pricing data are shown in Figures 7 and 8. Figures 7 and 8 are analogous to Figures 3 and 4, respectively. Figure 7 shows telephones 702 and 704, network switch 706, AMA register 710, RAE 712 (including SD 713), and CDD 708. Figure 7 also shows a two way connection, 714, between the switch and the RAE and a two-way connection 716 between the RAE and the CDD. These connections facilitate the query of the RAE as part of the process of assigning the route of the call. In particular, the two-way connection 714 allows the RAE to pass to the switch information, which has been required by the switch, as part of a query. The two-way connection 716 allows the transfer of information from the CDD to the RAE in case the information required by the switch is stored in the CDD and is not immediately available in the RAE; in which case the RAE can consult the CDD for information and then pass it to the switch. Figure 8 shows the 802 and 804 telephones, the 806 network switch, the AMA 810 register and the RC 812 - - (including SD 813). Figure 8 also shows a two-way connection 814, between the switch and the RC. The two-way connection allows the RC to answer the queries that are generated by the switch as part of the route assignment process. It is noted that, in relation to this date, the best method known to the applicant to carry out the aforementioned invention, is that which is clear from the present description of the invention. Having described the invention as above, it is claimed as property it contended in the following:

Claims (8)

1. A method to fix the price to a call that is made over a network, by a client of the network; where the amount to be invoiced to the customer by the call is determined in real time from user-specific data known to the network, and where the method is characterized in that it comprises the steps of: (a) generating a record that describes the call; (b) receive registration in a Machine of Real Time Analysis; and (c) use the customer-specific record and data to determine a value of the call with a fixed price for the call.

2. The method, according to claim 1, characterized in that the value of the call with fixed price incorporates one or more discounts to which the customer is assigned.

3. The method, according to claim 1, characterized in that it also comprises the step of: - updating the customer's current account by adding the value of the call with the price fixed to the customer's balance.

4. The method, according to claim 3, characterized in that the value of the call with fixed price incorporates one or more discounts that are assigned to the customer.

5. A system to set the price for a call that is made over a network, by a client of the network; where the amount to be invoiced to the customer by the call is determined in real time from customer-specific data known to the network, where the system is characterized in that it comprises: (a) means to generate a record describing the call; and (b) means to (1) receive the record, and (2) use the record and customer-specific data to determine a value of the call with fixed price, for the call.

6. The system, according to claim 5, characterized in that the value of the call with fixed price incorporates one or more discounts to which the customer is entitled.

7. The system, according to claim 5, characterized in that it also comprises: means for updating the customer's current account by adding the price to the customer's balance.

8. The system, according to claim 7, characterized in that the value of the call with fixed price incorporates one or more discounts to which the customer is entitled.