Method and apparatus for restricting credit card communication calls
AssigneeAmerican Telephone and Telegraph Company, AT&T Bell Laboratories
InventorVictor A. Franco
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A method and an apparatus are disclosed to enable a public switching network to limit the geographical calling area of calls charged to a credit card. When a credit card call is originated, the called party number is included as part of the credit card validation request. The called party number is compared against numbers stored in a call restriction table previously entered by the owner of the credit card. The network accepts or denies credit card calls as a result of this comparison.
Claims27
In a data base system, a method of providing a calling charge validation service for determining whether a communication call connection should be complete by an associated communication switching system, the method characterized by the steps of
- receiving from said switching system a call message including a call billing code and a dialing sequence identifying the destination of a call,
- accessing a data base associated with said billing code to obtain stored dialing data which identifies potential destinations for said call, and
- comparing the dialing sequence against said stored dialing data and, in response to said comparison, signaling said switching system to control a call connection to the destination determined by said dialing sequence.
Apparatus for use in conjunction with a communication system for providing a calling charge validation service for determining whether a communication call should be processed by said communication switching system, said apparatus including
- data base means for storing previously entered dialing data which identifies potential destinations for calls chargeable to a billing code,
- means for receiving from said switching system a call message icluding a call billing code and a dialing sequence identifying the destination of a call, and
- processor means for accessing said data base means using said received billing code, comparing the received dialing sequence with stored dialing data associated with said received billing code, and in response to said comparison, signaling said switching system to control a call connection to the destination determined by said dialing sequence.
A method of providing a calling charge validation service for a communication system for determining whether a communication call should be processed by said communication switching system, characterized by the steps of:
- receiving from a caller a call message including a call billing code and a dialing sequence identifying the destination of a call,
- accessing a data base associated with said billing code to obtain stored dialing data which identifies restricted and unrestricted call destinations, and
- comparing the received dialing sequence with said stored dialing data and, in response thereto, controlling a call connection to the destination determined by said dialing sequence.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.