Piggy-back number and routing isolation for cellular telephone switches

Abstract

A piggy-back number and routing isolation method for cellular telephone switches. A cellular customer dials a *800xxxx number, wherein xxxx represents some combination of symbols of arbitrary length identifying a specific Third Party Advertiser (TPA). The switch uses the leading *800 portion of the dialed *800xxxx number as an access code to direct the call to a special trunk. The switch strips the leading *800 portion from the *800xxxx number and inserts in its place a dialing prefix before making a call through the special trunk. The number dialed by the switch out through the special trunk is the mobile phone number assigned to the TPA as a cellular customer. The special trunk 'piggy-backs' the number translations and routing determinations because it is comprised of two ports of the single switch connected together in a 'loop-back' manner, so that calls routed out the first port are received immediately by the same switch at the second port. When the switch receives the call coming in from the special trunk, it uses a call forwarding feature associated with the TPA's mobile phone number to route the call directly to the TPA's land-based phone number. Two billing records are thus created out of one call: the cellular customer dialing the *800xxxx number; and the TPA's mobile phone number dialing the TPA's land-based phone number.