Communications network

A method of operating a communications network, including:

• calculating for each of a multiplicity of customers, using a selected one of a plurality of different tariffs distributed to a respective customer terminal attached to the network, charges for the use of network resources by the respective customer terminal attached to the network,
• measuring the loading of network resources, and
• varying one or more of the plurality of different tariffs in dependence upon the loading of the network resources, and in which different ones of the plurality of different tariffs have different respective volatilities.

A method of operating a communication network comprising:

• a) communicating tariff data to a user terminal connected to the network;
• b) calculating at the user terminal, a charge for traffic communicated between the network and the terminal using the tariff data, and making a payment;
• c) sampling only part of the traffic communicated between users and the network and for the sampled traffic comparing any payments made by users and the payment due according to the tariff.

A method of operating a communications network including:

• distributing a tariff via the communications network to a multiplicity of customer terminals connected to the communications network, and
• calculating using the tariff a charge for use by the customer terminal of the communications network,
• and in which the step of distributing the tariff includes steps of communicating separately a formula for calculation of network usage charges, and coefficients for use in the formula.

A method of operating a communications network, including automatically varying, depending on network loading as detected at a customer terminal, a tariff for network usage by a customer terminal, the tariff being distributed to the terminal and comprising a formula for calculating a charge as a function of the loading of the communications network for use by the customer terminal.

A method of operating a communications network supporting a packet-based internetworking protocol, the method comprising:

• distributing a tariff for the use of the communications network supporting a packet-based internetworking protocol via the communications network to a multiplicity of customer terminals connected to the communications network, the tariff comprising a variable formula for calculating a charge as a function of a detection congestion level of the communications network, for use by at least one of the customer terminals of the communications network, for use by at least one of the customer terminals of the communications network;
• and
• automatically calculating using the tariff a charge for use by the at least one customer terminal of the communications network in response to the detected congestion level.