Telephonic communications – Centralized switching system – Call distribution to operator
Reexamination Certificate
1998-09-25
2002-06-25
Hoosain, Allan (Department: 2645)
Telephonic communications
Centralized switching system
Call distribution to operator
C379S067100, C379S076000, C379S084000, C379S266010, C379S267000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06411707
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
In a communication system, the subscriber who wishes, for example, to make use of a particular service is greeted by an automatic announcement when selecting the service. Given a temporary overload of the service, the caller is instructed by a waiting statement that his call has been entered into a waiting queue. This waiting announcement can be repeated n times dependent on how often the operator of the service wishes to communicate this waiting statement to the caller. After the waiting statement has sequenced n times, the caller is forwarded, for example, to a free operator location OPn. After the n time repetition of the waiting statement, the caller is assigned a main or calling tone. The ringing or calling tone is followed by an operator greeting message that instructs the caller that he is now connected to the operator location. It can thus occur that the waiting announcement is prematurely ended by allocation of the call to an operator location. If the operator does not accept the call within a specific time, the call is again entered into the waiting queue. The same announcement procedure with temporary interruption by a ringing or calling tone thus begins anew.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is an object of the invention to specify a circuit arrangement and a method for announcement control that avoids the aforementioned disadvantages.
This object is achieved according to the invention by providing a circuit arrangement for announcement control of a first announcement potentially forwarded multiple times to a caller. A call distributor unit has a call processing unit for call acceptance and call forwarding of the caller to a called party. The call processing unit has an announcement check unit for determining a number of repetitions of a first announcement already forwarded to a caller and an announcement status of a current, forwarded first announcement. The call distributor unit forwards correspondingly communicated data to the called party so that the first announcement can be intentionally ended by the called party.
In a method of the invention for announcement control of a first announcement potentially forwarded multiple times to a caller given a call acceptance and a call forwarding of a call from the caller to the called party, a number of repetitions of the first announcement transmitted to the caller and an executive status of a current, first announcement forwarded to the caller is determined. The corresponding data is forwarded to the called party so that the called party can intentionally end the announcement.
In addition to yielding the advantage of a continuous announcement sequence without interruption by a calling or ringing tone, the invention also yields the further advantage that no undefined abort of an announcement occurs.
The invention yields the further advantage that a waiting statement and, following thereupon, an operator statement occurs after the one-time greeting of the subscriber.
The invention yields the further advantage that an operator announcement only ensues when this differs from the waiting announcement.
The invention yields the further advantage that the operator can intentionally prepare for the call since the operator location is informed of the frequency of the waiting announcements transmitted to the caller as well as of the time span of the current announcement duration of the waiting announcement.
REFERENCES:
patent: 4788715 (1988-11-01), Lee
patent: 5181236 (1993-01-01), LaVallee et al.
patent: 5271058 (1993-12-01), Andrews et al.
patent: 5274700 (1993-12-01), Gechter et al.
patent: 5469504 (1995-11-01), Blaha
patent: 5555299 (1996-09-01), Maloney et al.
Hoosain Allan
Morrison & Foerster / LLP
Siemens Aktiengesellschaft
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