Telephonic communications – Plural exchange network or interconnection – With interexchange network routing
Reexamination Certificate
1997-02-03
2001-11-27
Zele, Krista (Department: 2748)
Telephonic communications
Plural exchange network or interconnection
With interexchange network routing
C379S219000, C379S220010, C379S258000, C379S273000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06324277
ABSTRACT:
TECHNICAL FIELD
This invention relates to methods and apparatus for providing competitive, local and toll service in a national telecommunications network.
Problem
The U.S. telecommunications network is in a state of transition. During the next several years, it is expected that the monopoly held by local exchange carriers will be substantially altered and that Competitive Access Providers (CAPs) will begin to offer customer access for toll calls to the already competitive interexchange carriers, will provide local exchange service, or both. In order to accomplish this goal without creating an excessive burden on customers who wish to receive service from a CAP, it is expected that there will be a requirement that a change to a CAP need not be accompanied by a change of telephone number. Further in the long run, it is expected that customers will be able to move to another geographic location within some reasonably defined region, and, in moving, change their local carrier, the switch from which they are being served, or both. The ability to change service providers without moving is called service provider number portability; the ability to change location without changing a service provider is called geographic number or location portability. It is expected that in the not too distant future both will be required. In order to provide service in the face of service provider number portability and geographic number portability, the traditional tie between a customer's serving central office and the NPA-NXX portion of that customer's telephone number will have to be broken and alternate arrangements provided. Such alternate arrangements already exist for 700 service wherein the last seven digits of a 700 number bear no relation to the geographic location of the associated telephone customer. Other service access codes such as 500 are being planned for use with similar services. At the present time, this type of facility is limited to a small fraction of telephone customers. Accordingly, the problem in the prior art is that no sound economic arrangement has been proposed which offers geographic number portability and service provider number portability to most telephone customers.
Solution
The above problem is solved and an advance is made over the prior art in accordance with our invention wherein each local exchange carrier is provided with access to a local universal database listing all numbers for a given local region served by a local exchange carrier and wherein each interexchange carrier is provided with access to a national database listing all numbers for the nation. (Clearly, both of these databases can be implemented incrementally during a period of transition wherein for example, the national database need only store data for regions which have implemented service provider number portability and/or geographic number portability and within these regions only for office codes which have diversity in the location and/or the local exchange carrier of their subscribers.) For local calls, the local database is accessed to determine the identity of the terminating local exchange carrier and the terminating switch of the called customer while the national database is accessed to obtain similar information for toll calls. Advantageously, with this arrangement, the originating switch or a switch of an interexchange carrier can determine the identity of the local carrier serving the called customer and the switch from which that called customer is served.
In accordance with one feature of the invention, an alternate terminating carrier and terminating switch can be identified for customers who require especially reliable service so that if the preferred carrier and switch are inaccessible, the terminating customer may be reached by an alternate route. In accordance with another aspect of the invention, call detail records for individual calls include the identity of the terminating exchange carrier and switch for toll calls. The originating local carrier and switch must also be identified if the interexchange carrier is to produce the billing record for a call, in order to rate calls properly with geographic and/or service provider portability.
For local carrier switches for local or toll calls, the identity of the originating local exchange carrier and switch, or the interexchange carrier, respectively, can be optionally recorded in order to allow a single billing center to process calls from a plurality of carriers without requiring that the records of each carrier switch be segregated.
In order to route calls in a network which has local number portability, it is necessary to have a location routing number for routing calls to the particular switch which serves the called customer. Such a location routing number is used to identify that switch so that the call may be routed there. In accordance with one feature of applicants'invention, this location routing number (LRN) comprises an area code and office code (NPA-NXX) wherein each switch of the network has a unique LRN. If a switch serves customers having several different office codes, perhaps even office codes and having different NPA codes, such a switch is identified by a single NPA-NXX code. While it may be convenient to assign an NPA-NXX code that is used by at least some of the customers served by switch, it is not necessary; because each switch must have a distinct location routing number, it may not be possible, in some cases, for some of the switches, especially smaller switches of competitive access providers. However, if the switch is identified by an NPA-NXX code of some of the telephones that it serves, routing translations can remain the same for those telephones. Advantageously, the use of an NPA-NXX code as a location routing number provides a high degree of compatibility with existing methods of routing telephone calls.
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Akinpelu Akinwale Ademola
Bhagat Promod Kumar
Garoutte Dana Lee
Hatalla Anthony
Hirsch Robert Bruce
AT&T Corp.
Hoosain Allan
Zele Krista
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