JP2994064B2 - Automatic billing system for switching system - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to an automatic charging system for a switching system, and more particularly, to an automatic charging system for a fee in a semi-automatic switching system in which an operator is involved.

[0002] In a semi-automatic switching system for connecting a line between a calling party and a called party through an exchange, a fee, which is an intervention fee of the exchange, is charged in addition to the call charge. In such a system, it is necessary to accurately charge the commission.

[0003]

2. Description of the Related Art FIG. 7 shows a configuration diagram of a billing system of a conventional switching system. In FIG. 1, reference numerals 1 and 2 denote subscriber telephones, which are accommodated in a calling station and a receiving station, respectively. The incoming trunk (ICT) 4 is seized by the originating call from the subscriber's telephone 1 at the originating station, and the network (NW) 3
And a position trunk (PST) 6 and connected to an exchange (POS) 7. Upon receiving the telephone number of the subscriber's telephone 2 of the called party B from the caller A, the switchboard (POS) 7 captures the outgoing trunk (OGT) 5 via the position trunk (PST) 6 and the network 3. Then, a line connection with the subscriber telephone 2 of the called station is made. Also, 8
Is an exchange, and 9 is a file memory (FM), which has a call ticket. Reference numeral 10 denotes a central control unit that controls the NW 3 and the like.

[0004] Now, a subscriber telephone 1 is connected to a subscriber telephone 2.
ICT4, NW3 and P
The exchange board 7 detects this via ST6. The switchboard 7 has a display unit of a call type, and the exchange 8 switches the line connected to the position trunk 6 via the ICT 4 and the NW 3 based on the call, to the subscriber telephone 2 via the NW 3 and the OGT 5. The position trunk 6 is controlled so as to connect to. This enables a call between the subscriber's telephone 1 (caller A) and the subscriber's telephone 2 (called party B).

Here, the switching board 7 creates a call ticket in the FM 9 when receiving a call from the subscriber's telephone 1, and sets the telephone numbers, call types, call start times, and telephone numbers of the subscriber's telephones 1 and 2.
It stores information such as a unit charge per several times of the route of the subscriber telephone set 2 and a route number. When the exchange 8 confirms the start of the call between the subscriber telephones 1 and 2,
Pressing the charge key on the exchange 7 starts charging.

[0006] When the above-mentioned call is completed, the call charge is automatically calculated from the call time and the charging rate for each location set in the storage unit of the system. The sum is added to the telephone ticket in the FM 9 together with the telephone numbers of the subscriber telephones 1 and 2, the call type, the call start time, the call time, the charging rate, and the like. The amount written on the call ticket is automatically recorded on a magnetic tape as billing material, and the general-purpose computer analyzes the bill and usually charges the caller A.

Here, the types of calls handled by the exchange with a fee include a standby ground call for notifying the called party of a call from the calling party, and a call of the called party at a time desired by the calling party. Call when a call is made, when the called party cannot answer because the other party is busy, etc., an accidental call that calls again after a predetermined time, a designated call that specifies only a specific called party,
There are a collect call for charging the called party, a charge notification call for notifying the caller of the call charge after the call is completed, and a call time designation call for notifying the call time specified by the caller during the call.

[0008]

Conventionally, however, the commission, which is the intermediary cost of the exchange 8, is calculated manually by the exchange at the time of termination of the subscriber's call based on the type of call and the communication distance. As a result, calculation errors may occur and fraud may occur.

Conventionally, there has been no means for collecting only a fee for a call for which a call between the calling party A and the called party B has not been established and charging has not been started.

[0010] The present invention has been made in view of the above points,
It is an object of the present invention to provide an automatic charging system for an exchange system which solves the above-mentioned problem by providing a fee table and automatically calculating a fee.

[0011]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing the principle of an automatic accounting system for a switching system according to the present invention. According to the present invention, a fee table 12 in which commission data of a call handled by a switching board 11 is stored in advance, determining means 13 for determining whether or not a call received by the switching board 11 is a handling call, and determining means 13 When it is determined that a call handled by
There is a charge calculating means 14 for automatically calculating a charge at the end of the call and adding the charge to the call charge by referring to the charge table 12 according to the type of the incoming call.

[0012]

According to the present invention, the commission of a call treated at the exchange board 11 is indexed from the commission table 12 and automatically calculated by the commission calculation means 14, so that the manual calculation of the commission by the operator is unnecessary. it can.

[0013]

FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing one embodiment of the present invention. In the figure, the same components as those in FIGS. 1 and 7 are denoted by the same reference numerals, and description thereof will be omitted. In FIG. 2, reference numeral 21 denotes a central control unit (CC), reference numeral 22 denotes a fee table, and reference numeral 23 denotes a memory ticket, which are connected to the NW 3 respectively. The central control unit 21 has an arithmetic function,
And the fee calculation means 14 are realized by software operation. The commission table 22 is the commission table 1 of FIG.
2 and is stored in the memory together with the memory ticket 23. The memory ticket 23 is a memory for storing call charges, commissions, charging start information, and the like for calls handled by the exchange (calls handled by the exchange). The switching board 7 has a display unit for displaying a call type and a fee.

The fee table 22 is, as shown in FIG.
Calls that do not start charging, that is, calls that do not require a call due to a cancel call due to absence of the other party (for example, a desired call,
Charge data comprising a flag C indicating whether the call is a designated call, a standby ground call, an accident call, and the like, and a charge amount I,
It is stored in a table according to each of the call type and the time zone.

Next, the operation of the semi-automatic switching system according to the present embodiment having such a configuration will be described. First, when a call from the calling subscriber's telephone 1 is detected by the exchange 7, the exchange 8 sets the call type by key operation (step 41 in FIG. 4).
Then, the central control unit 21 indexes the fee data corresponding to the set call type from the fee table 22 and records the indexed fee data on the memory ticket 23 used for the semi-automatic call exchange process. (Step 42 in FIG. 4), the set call type and the indexed fee are displayed on the display unit of the exchange 7 (Step 43 in FIG. 4).

Subsequently, the exchange 8 calls the called subscriber's telephone 2 by operating a key. When the called subscriber telephone 2 answers, the exchange 8 confirms the call quality, presses the charge start key (charge key) to disconnect the call from the exchange 7, and positions between the subscriber telephones 1 and 2. A call is started via the trunk 6. At this time, the charging start time is recorded in the memory ticket 23.

Subsequently, in this embodiment, the central control unit 21 operates in accordance with the flowchart shown in FIG. In the figure, first, it is determined whether or not the call is a completed call, that is, whether the call has ended (step 51). If the call has not ended, it is determined whether or not the call has not started charging (step 52). If the call is not a charging non-start call, the process is terminated (step 59), and the flow waits for the flowchart to be activated again for a predetermined period. On the other hand, if it is determined in step 51 that the call is a completed call, or if it is determined in step 52 that the call is a non-charging call, a call type is obtained from the memory ticket 23 (step 53), and the call type is determined from the call type. The commission data is obtained (step 54). Next, the charge target display of the fee table 22 is compared with the charge start display of the memory ticket 23 (step 55), and it is determined whether or not the call is the target of the charge (step 56).

If the call is not a chargeable call, this process is terminated (step 59). If the call is a chargeable call, the call is automatically calculated and stored in the memory ticket 23 at the end of the call based on the call time and the charging rate. The call fee is read (step 57), the applicable fee is added to the call fee, and the added amount is stored in the memory ticket 23 (step 58). The fee stored in the ticket memory 23 is then recorded on a magnetic tape as billing material. In this way, without the intervention of the operator 8
The commission can be calculated. Therefore, it is possible to prevent fraudulent, incorrect calculation, forgetting to take the exchange 8, and the like.

In the case of a non-billing call, even if the call is canceled due to the absence of the other party (even if the call is not a completed call), only the call fee is reduced to zero, and a fee corresponding to the call type is automatically charged. It can be calculated and charged.

Further, by providing the fee table 22 in the time zone, different amounts of fees can be collected from the clock device built in the central control device 21 according to the service providing time.

In the above-described embodiment, the commission is 8
However, a function for changing a fee due to a complaint from the subscriber (for example, poor call quality) or a function of performing suppression may be added. In this case, as shown in the flowchart of FIG. 6, when accepting a call from the calling subscriber's telephone 1, the exchange 8 reads out a charge corresponding to the call type from the memory ticket 23 (step 61), and reads it from the exchange board 7.
Will be displayed on the display of
The newly changed fee is written into the memory ticket 23 by the key operation (step 62). Thereby, the changed commission is displayed on the display unit of the exchange board 7.

The above fee may be changed by a rate change command by the exchange holder.

[0023]

As described above, according to the present invention, the manual calculation of the commission by the operator can be dispensed with, so that it is possible to prevent a charging error due to a calculation error due to the operator's calculation or a charge omission due to forgetting the calculation. It can also prevent fraudulent exchanges, and in the case of a call that does not start a call, the fee can be calculated automatically even if the call is not ended, eliminating the need for complicated fee calculation. It is advantageous in that it can improve the workability of the operator because it is possible.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a principle block diagram of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a configuration diagram of one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 3 is an explanatory diagram of a fee table.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart for explaining an operation before the start of a call in FIG. 2;

FIG. 5 is a flowchart for explaining an operation of the embodiment at the end of the call in FIG. 2;

FIG. 6 is a flowchart illustrating an operation of an additional function according to an embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 7 is a configuration diagram of an example of a conventional system.

[Explanation of symbols]

 7, 11 exchange stand 12 fee table 13 determining means 14 fee calculating means 21 central control device 22 fee table 23 memory ticket

Continuation of front page (56) References JP-A-58-222658 (JP, A) (58) Fields investigated (Int. Cl. ⁶ , DB name) H04M 3/00 H04M 3/16-3/20 H04M 3 / 38-3/40 H04M 3/60-3/64 H04M 7/00-7/16 H04M 15/00-15/38

Claims (2)

(57) [Claims] An exchange table (11) is provided, said exchange table (1).
In the automatic charging system of the switching system for charging a fee in accordance with the type of a call handled by 1), a charge table (1) in which commission data of the call handled by the device is stored in advance.
2), a determining means (13) for determining whether or not the call received by the switching board (11) is a call handled by the switching board (11);
When it is determined in 3) that the call treated as a car is received, the fee is automatically calculated at the end of the call by referring to the fee table (12) according to the type of the incoming call and added to the call charge. An automatic charging system for an exchange system, comprising a fee calculating means (14). 2. The fee table (12) stores fee data which differs depending on a call type and a time zone and has a flag indicating whether or not the call is a non-billing call. The method according to claim 1, wherein when the incoming call is a non-charging call, the fee is calculated regardless of the presence or absence of the call.