System and method for pre-paid and pay-per-use internet services

In a telephone network, a method for providing pay-per-use access to an internet service provider using a billing system of the telephone network, comprising:

• (a) receiving an incoming call from a calling party at a switch serving the internet service provider telephone number, wherein a called party field associated with said incoming call stores the internet service provider telephone number;
• (b) sending a query from the switch to a service control point in response to a call placed to an internet service provider telephone number, wherein the query includes a calling party number;
• (c) in response to the query, sending a termination instruction and a notification instruction to the switch, wherein a calling party field in the termination instruction includes a pre-determined code that is sent to the internet service provider to be used to authorize a calling party to access resources of the internet service provider, and wherein said pre-determined code is based at least in part on the calling party number;
• (d) logging a connection time associated with the call established between the calling party number and the internet service provider telephone number;
• and
• (e) creating a bill for the calling party number for the connection time.

In a telephone network, a method for providing pre-paid access to an internet service provider using a billing system of the telephone network, comprising:

• (a) establishing a database comprising a pre-paid subscriber number and an amount of pre-paid units;
• (b) receiving an incoming call from a calling party at a switch serving an internet service provider telephone number, wherein a called party field in the incoming call is an internet service provider telephone number;
• (c) sending a query from the switch to the database in response to the call, wherein the query includes a calling party number;
• (d) responding to the query with a pre-determined code stored in a calling party field that is sent to the internet service provider by a service control point through a gateway when the calling party number is the pre-paid subscriber number, wherein said pre-determined code is an authorized code authorizing the calling party to access resources of the internet service provider;
• (e) terminating the call to the internet service provider number with the pre-determined code in a calling party field when the calling party number is the pre-paid subscriber number;
• and
• (f) subtracting a usage amount from the amount of pre-paid units in the database.

In a telephone network, a method for providing pay-per-use access to an internet service provider using a billing system of the telephone network, comprising:

• (a) receiving an incoming call from a calling party at a switch serving an internet service provider telephone number, wherein a called party field associated with said incoming call stores the internet service provider telephone number;
• (b) sending a query from the switch to a service control point in response to a call placed to an internet service provider telephone number, wherein the query includes a calling party number;
• (b) in response to the query, sending a termination instruction and a notification instruction, wherein a calling party field in the termination instruction includes a pre-determined code which is sent to the internet service provider through a gate way to be used to authorize the calling party to access the resources of the internet service provider and said pre-determined code is based at least in part on the calling party number;
• (c) logging a connection time associated with the call established between the calling party number and the internet service provider telephone number;
• and
• (d) creating a bill for the calling party number for the connection time.