Importance

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Abstract

To provide toll services but limit the amount of such services, toll calls from a party's line are routed to selected calling card type processing equipment. However, so that such calling party's have equal access to multiple carriers and need not dial additional digits, the communications network supplies calling and dialed number information to the processing equipment. The network preferably identifies the call as requiring a special application (without user input of billing number or PIN information). The processing equipment performs all necessary account related screening, e.g. to determine the remaining amount of funds available for the caller's toll services, to route the call and to continuously rate the call cost for the duration of the call. If there are no remaining funds, the call is disallowed. If the funds run-out during the call, the calling card type processing equipment interrupts the call and informs the caller. The invention may be implemented using switch-based PIC functionality to route the calls to the selected service provider's equipment. The preferred embodiment, however, utilizes intelligent network processing, to select one provider's equipment, route the call to that provider's equipment, and supply the necessary information to the equipment, in order to facilitate the account processing without further input from the caller. The caller need only dial a 1+ the 10-digit number to place a toll call, in the normal manner.

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First Claim