Convergent Billing

The Billing story of BSNL:Challenges ahead.

Subrata Chatterjee, DGM-ITIT Project Circle, BSNL

Manual Billing

In the early days of DOT, the Commercial/ Billing/ Accounting activities were conducted manually.

Billing was simple. There was a flat rate per call. Just send an Invoice and collect payment;

Computerization of BillingBy and by, Billing activities got computerized. The Calcutta Telephones computerized their billing operations in 1964;

In the 1980s, an early version of the TBL package was being used in many places;

The Trichur package, a character based application with a Billing server and ‘dumb’terminals came up in the early nineties, as billing operations grew more complex.

Trichur Billing packageBut the Trichur package never required much Networking, as all other activities like Commercial and Accounting were manually conducted.

Growing ComplexitiesMany repetitive activities like feeding Commercial data into Trichur system at the end of the day or transporting /mailing the same to the Trichur system made life very inconvenient;

Gradually the Commercial/TRA activities grew more complex: Many CSCs were established to collect payments, accept New Phone Connections(NPC), requests, issue duplicate bills, generate Demand Notes, etc.

Expansion of Network became inevitable;

The need for a GUI-based, WAN supported-Integrated application was felt to meet the complex operations.

Advent of DotsoftIn early 1998, Dotsoft, an in-house package was deployed at Guntur in AP.Dotsoft is an integrated telecom database system comprising commercial, billing, accounting, fault repair service and directory enquiry services.

All requests on the CSCsflow to the Commercial or TRA sections as the case may be.

Diagram showing central database at Nodal SSA to which all SSAs are connected and are partitioned by Virtual Private Database (VPD).A Central Server, central man-power resources and a highly reduced number of Oracle licenses, resulted into higher economy.

DB

SSA-2

SSA-n

Nodal SSA

Multi-SSA DotsoftSSA-3

SSA-1

NASHIK

ISDNNetwork

DialupNetwork

Telephone Bhawan

BSNL PCM(Leased Line) Network

PC

ISDNNetworkPCM

E1/R2PRI

2MB Leased Line toNashik

LEGEND

Category C RouterCategory D router

Server

24 Port Switch

Category A Router

G.703 to V.35 Converter

8 Port HUBDial Up Modem

User Terminal2Mb LL LinkDial Up linkISDN BRI

12 Port Switch

2MB

Leas

ed Li

ne to

Nas

hik

LAN Extender

SMP

ISDN PRIE1/R2

CND Comml

UTP Uplink

CND

PC PC

Burrabazar Exchange

ISDNNetworkPCM

DialUp

RLU – 1 to 5

DialupNetwork

RLU – 1 to 4

RLU -1 to 5

RATNAGIRI

RAIGAD

SATARA

Category B Router

PC PC

ISDNNetworkPCM Dial

Up

RLU -1 to 5RLU -1 to 17

DHULE

External Co’s Building

2 Mb leased line to the 8 Area Offices

ISDNNetworkPCM

RLU -1 to 5

NANDED

AM (N) /CO’s Office

PC

ISDNNetworkPCM

DialUp

RLU -1 to 9RLU -1 to 4

PARBHANI

Exchange

Existing 32 port RASMM Fiber Link

PC PC

ISDNNetwork

DialUp

DialupNetwork

RLU – 1 to 15

LATUR

RLU – 1 to 5

Extl. Building AOTR & CO’s Bldg

PCM

Convergent Billing i.e. Single bill process for WLL Customers, ISDN Customers, Plan opted Customers, Normal Customers, Corporate Customers, Group (i.e. Monthly/ Bi-Monthly) Customers;

But Billing essentially remains MCU based. Only OMR/CMR information is extracted manually from the PSTN switches and uploaded into the billing system in a suitable text format;

Convergent Billing within Dotsoft

Leased Circuit BillingLeased Circuit Billing is done manually across BSNL.

IOBAS : Interconnect Billing

• This is a CDR based billing system;• Rating is done by IUC-IV tables;• Problems remain with 100% CDR collection;• Other issues like, Trunk Group changes intimation

on time, Supplementary bills, Dispute settlement, etc.

Leased Circuit BillingLeased Circuit Billing is done manually across BSNL.

• Utilizing the infrastructure of IOBAS, ILDO Billing was started in Dec’ 06

• One single invoice for BSNL covering all ILDO switches

• WTR is the Bill Issuing Authority• Limited tender floated among the ASPs of IOBAS for

finalizing the Primary ASP• Primary ASP coordinates with other ASPs and

generates the I/C Invoice and the O/G Statement • M/s. Tech Mahindra is the Primary ASP

ILDO Billing

ILDO Billing• Presently Telecom Italia Sparkle (TIS) is the only

one Foreign Carrier (FC) using Bharat - Lanka Cable System;

• The I/C invoice and the O/G statement for TIS is being issued by IOBAS within time;

• About 20 Million O/G Minutes per month and about 78,175 I/C Minutes were billed for Feb’07;

• US $ 1.322 Million is the O/G amount for Feb’07;• US $ 3,815 is the I/C Bill for Feb’07;

Data-one (Broadband) billing• An usage based billing system, designed in-house,

for BSNL’s broadband services;• 7,65,512 customers billed for the month of Feb’07.• Ave. rev Rs. 629/- per user;• Total monthly billing 48.21 cr. (Feb’07) Excluding

Modem Rental amount;• About 70,000 customers in Unlimited Plans.• Max. no. of customers are in TN (1.5 Lakh),

Karnataka (1.25 Lakh), MH (90,000);

Games on Demand (GoD) Billing• Started in Jan 2007 in association with M/s. India

Games as a franchisee.• 244 customers are billed/to be billed for the

month of Feb’07.• Patches for DoTSOFT and Trichur released for

billing the customers.• Patches for the other billing softwares used by the

SSAs to be developed/ implemented by the SSAs• Revenue share at the level of Circle.

Multi-play (IPTV) Billing• Started on 15/03/2007 in association with M/s.

MKCL and M/s. Divinet as a Joint Franchisee in Pune.

• Presently IPTV Services and Video on Demand (VoD) are available.

• Service was free up to 30/04/2007.• Developed code for interfacing between operational

system (system of Franchisee) and billing system.• Scheduled to test run the billing software in the first

week of Apr’07.

Leased Circuit Billing• Started on 15/03/2007 in association with M/s.

MKCL and M/s. Divinet as a Joint Franchisee in Pune.

• Presently IPTV Services and Video on Demand (VoD) are available.

• Service was free up to 30/04/2007. • Developed code for interfacing between operational

system (system of Franchisee) and billing system.• Scheduled to test run the billing software in the first

week of Apr’07.

• Cellular services provided Circle wise;• Heart of Customer Care for Mobile Services;• A truly CDR based billing system;

GSM Billing: Cellone

MCAP JNLBIPCAPLBX

CPMGuides Usage to Customer DB

COL

Collections

BillFormatter

BillDispatcher

Journals

COM

Communication Accumulatorand Rater

BillPreparer

RAP

TIP

Credit Card

Lock Box

EFT

Electronic Funds

Transfer

BIF BID

TOP

Usage Re-rater

Table-driven Input Processor

TAP3 Output ProcessorMPS

Billing Financials

GSM Billing: CelloneThe Kenan Billing system consists of-:

• Data Mediation;• Order Management; (OM)• Billing Platform (BP)• Remedy (Fault Tracking System)• Inter-Connect Billing;• Customer driven network event collected by

Mediation;• Usage can be rated based on attributes,

Kenan/BP

Kenan/OM

Mediation

Provisioning

ICB

Remedy

B&CCS

Network Elements

External payments

EBPP System

ECS(DD) / RBI

Invoice Printing

SIM PPC / Manufacturer

WAN – routers over E1 lines

CSRs CSRs CSRs CSRs

Credit Cards

GL System / Journals

Receipt Printing

GUIs of BP, OM and Remedy

Network Elements

Architecture of Kenan/BP

The next step towards convergence…..

CDR based Billing and Customer Care for Land-lines.

Country wide connectivity

DC and SSA Network Deployment Architecture

E1

NIB-2Network

Pedge1841

Pedge1841

Pedge1841

E3/STM-3

E3/STM-3

Pedge1841

To SSAsTo SSAs

Aggregation/Central Router

Cisco 7500

Aggregation/CentralRouter

Cisco 7500

E1

Exchange RtrCisco 2811 Exchange Rtr

Cisco 2811

PSTNSwitch

PSTNSwitch

E1E1

To LEsTo LEs

AAAServer

NIDS Firewall

Backbone RtrCisco 7609

Backbone RtrCisco 7609

I

Ethernet Swt. II(Cisco 2950)

IBM Compatible

IBM Compatible

RASCisco AS5350

RASCisco AS5350

Internet RtrCisco 7609

Internet RtrCisco 7609

InternetDial-up/ISDN

Eth Swt-ICisco 6509

Eth Swt-ICisco 6509

FirewallNIDS

Remote Rtr/Eth Ext1841/Dax4021

Eth Swt2950

Local LAN

Remote Rtr/Eth Ext1841/Dax4021

To CSR Center

Eth Swt2950

LAN To CSR

Data CenterInfrastructure

Collection Methodology of CDRs

Backbone Router Backbone

Router

E3/STM-1 E3/STM-1

Data Center

FirewallFirewallEthSWITCH

NIDS

Mediation System

SSA

E1

AggregationRouter

NIB – MPLS VPNNetwork

Edge Rtr

E1

Edge Rtr

Edge Rtr

Edge RtrEdge Rtr

Edge Rtr

Aggregation Router

E1

PSTNSwt.

LE RouterLocal Exchange

E1

LE Router

PSTNSwt.

Call Made

Call Received

Call Completed

CDR Generated

MTE

CDOT

CES

CDR Data Flow from LE to DC

MPLS Cloud

NOC(DC)

Aggregation Central

Aggregation

NOC(DR)

CDR Collector CDR Collector

Exchange

PSTN

Exchange

PSTN

X.25 over IP

MPLS-VPN

X.25 over IP

Remote Exchange

X.25

X.25

ExchangeRouter

(Cisco 2811)

BackboneRouter

(Cisco 7609)

BackboneRouter

(Cisco 7609)

PE Router(Cisco7613)




E1 link

Data CenterRouter

(Cisco 7513)

Data CenterRouter

(Cisco 7513)

PSTNSwitch

PSTNSwitch




E1 link

PSTNSwitch

PSTNSwitch

PSTNSwitch

ExchangeRouter

(Cisco 2811)

PSTNSwitch

AggregationRouter

(Cisco 7507)

NIB-2MPLS VPN

Network

X.25

X.25 overTCP/IP

IP overMPLS-VPN

X.25 overTCP/IP

X.25orIP

CDR Collectors

Seri al li n

k

Seri

all i

nk

E3 / STM-1 link

GigE

10/100Ethernet


ExchangeRouter

(Cisco 2811)

PSTNSwitch

CentralRouter

(Cisco 7513)

Data CenterLAN

ExchangeRouter

(Cisco 2811)

ExchangeRouter

(Cisco 2811)

ExchangeRouter

(Cisco 2811)

ExchangeRouter

(Cisco 2811)

AggregationRouter

(Cisco 7507)


CDR based Billing & Customer Care• Move from telephone based system to Customer based

system• Accurate and timely invoicing of call details to generate

error free bills• Supports different tariffs, different Billing cycles,

different discounting schemes for different category of subscribers.

• Pre-paid and Post Paid integration possible• Easy implementation of change in business policies

and rules.• Host of online services, online query and prompt customer

response

CDR based Billing & Customer Care


CDR based Billing & Customer Care• Online mediation of CDRs eliminates the need of bill data

transportation, eliminating fraud on this account• Proper accounting of payments & receivables for better

financial management • Standard and adhoc reporting on all aspects of the business • Facilitate market studies and analyses for forming optimal

sales strategies and assess business performance of self and partners, Churn analysis and prevention.

• Minimization of internal and external frauds• System consolidation resulting in reduction of O&M cost.

Why Mediation System ?• Facilitates on line Collection, Processing &

Distribution of raw CDRs & meter reading;• Removes human interference between switching &

billing system• Provisioning of Subscriber Services• Alarm Generation• Support to Fraud Management & Control• Single source of data for Interconnect Settlement,

Retail Billing and Fraud Management;

Features of Mediation System

• Sits between Network elements and BP• Collection, Processing & Distribution of CDRs• Selection & validation of CDRs• Merging of Multiple CDRs• Duplicate CDR detection• Time gap detection• Flexible processing & error handling of CDRs• Database Lookup• CDR collection Scheduling

Features of Mediation System

• CDR collection Scheduling• Monitoring of Active Jobs• Maintenance of Logs (Event, Error etc)• Elimination/Filtering of CDRs• Data partitioning into different streams based

on user-defined criteria• Service Provisioning

Billing and Accounting• Creation and maintenance of tariff plans as

per BSNL’s requirements• Ordering of services and activation of billing • Maintenance of individual subscriber ledger

accounts• Payment noting.• Maintenance of deposit accounts• Subscriber hierarchies • Contracts configuration

Billing and Accounting

• Easily configurable rating plans • Differential rating for CUG • Special Calls, Frequent numbers, Friends and

Family • Tariff and product structures flexibly • Ability to assign a unique tariff to each customer or

same tariff to a group of customers.• Special pricing based on dates to support holiday

rates.

Billing and Accounting• Corporate billing• Different methods of discounting • Billing hierarchies • Ability to provide taxes with respect to all charge

types • Ad hoc bill (Bill on Demand)• Ability to charge late payment fees. • Journal Creation and Posting to General Ledger• Tight integration between the Billing Application

and a CRM

CRM• Order Fulfillment to Billing• Customer Call to Problem Resolution• Marketing Campaign to Order Capture• Integration with Order management, billing, CTI

and IVRS, Provisioning systems and with all customer related subsystems

• Integration with Complaint Handling system• Workflow• Customer service through call centre, E-Mail,

SMS, FAX, Web Self Care(WSC), letter

BSS - A Complete Solution

InventoryInventory

Cus

tom

er C

are

Cus

tom

er C

are

Customer CareCustomer Care

Med

iatio

nM

edia

tion

BillingBilling

RatingRating

PaymentsPayments Report Report GenerationGeneration

Prov

isio

ning

Prov

isio

ning

DATABASEDATABASE

Printing System/ Printing System/ Print VendorPrint Vendor Payment InterfacesPayment Interfaces

Cr Card/Banks/Chq etcCr Card/Banks/Chq etc..

General LedgerGeneral LedgerSystemSystem

Web Self CareWeb Self Care

ClaearingClaearing HouseHouseoror

Other SourcesOther Sources

NetworkNetwork

Self CareSelf CareAAAAAA

ContentContent

TodaySeparate Service Networks

Separate Access Transport & Switching Networks

INET

ot

her D

ata

/IP N

etw

orks

PLM

N

PSTN

/ISD

N

Services

Current Scenario

Problems of Existing network• Slow to develop new features and capabilities.• Expensive upgrades and operating expenses.• Proprietary vendor troubles• Large power and cooling requirements.• Limited migration strategy to New tech.• Product/model obsolescence.

In other words CONVERGENCE is the need of the hour……..

• The Convergence and requirement of fast deployment of new services at less cost……

…….gives birth toNGNOR

NEXT GENERATION NETWORKS

Present Day Networks Next Generation Networks (NGN)

Gateways

Internet

Wireless TelephoneSystem

Workstation

IntegratedServices Over IP

Workstation

Evolving towards IP Communications

NGN Concept

• Each service has its own network– Multiplied operational costs

• Each network managed separately– No service interaction

• Multiple customer profiles

• Seamless service linkage– All services over any access

• One network for any service– Unified management structure

• Single customer profile

Today New Service Network

Private DataInternet Deep Access

Services EdgeMulti-service Aggregation

MPLS Core

OSS OSS OSS OSS OSS OSS

Mobile

NB VoiceWAN

Customer Customer

Migrate

Video

NGN :Definition (As per ITU)NGN is a packet based network which is able to provide telecom services and able to make use of multiple broadband, QoS enabled transport technologies in which service related functions are independent from underlying transport related technologies.

NGN :Definition (As per ETSI)NGN is a concept for defining and deploying networks, which due to their formal separation into different layers and planes and use of open interfaces, offers service providers and operators a platform which can evolve in a step-by-step manner to create, deploy and manage innovative services.

Towards Convergent Billing……

Transition to Convergent Services•Transition from static market environment to dynamic fast-paced innovation; •From low speed to high speed.•From divergence to convergence •From local to global;•From fixed to mobile(3G);•From ‘sometimes on’ to ‘always on’;•From one-media to multi-media;•From distinct to bundled;•From circuit switched to packet based networks;

Traditional Billing vs Convergent Billing•Traditional billing systems are tied to individual technologies.•Call detail records (CDRs) are generated by wireline voice switches. •IP flow records are generated by Cisco routers. •PVC(Permanent Virtual Connection) traffic history is gathered from ATM and Frame Relay devices. •RADIUS accounting records monitor switched dial-up or ISDN Internet access, media through Cable network;•At its core, convergent billing is the integration of all service charges onto a single customer invoice. Convergent billing means creating a unified view of the customer ― and all services provided to that customer ― for single-point customer care.

Why Convergent Billing?•Customers want to purchase many communications services from single provider;•Customers want all services invoiced on a single consolidated bill. •Receiving a single bill simplifies processing and payment for the customer. •A unified bill enables cross-service discounts, so that customers who order multiple services can receive preferential pricing. •Multi-service providers who successfully create a unified view of each customer gain a competitive edge that helps them hold onto existing customers and attract new ones.

Features of Convergent Billing•At the lowest level, Convergent billing involves gathering data in various formats, originating from diverse systems, and mediatingit into a common format. One industry effort that may facilitate this is the standard IP detail record (IPDR) format being defined by IPDR.org.•Options for Billing by second, byte (volume) or packet or Billing by Event. (these options can be mixed and matched with a flat fee in addition).•Supports 3G services/VoIP/ circuit-switch for voice, Interconnect billing, etc.

Features of Convergent Billing• Decoupling of service provision and network;•Can separate network billing with Service billing;•Supports multi-party billing;

•Unrestricted access by users to different service providers;

Features of Convergent Billing•Highly scalable;•Can be customized (parents can pre-pay a part of the bill);•Multi-service data collection and mediation possible;•Flexible enough to bill by volume or content type or by event;•Its versatility can be leveraged to use this as a strategic selling tool;•VoIP/ IPTV gets a new lease of life in this environment, being cheap and content-rich. It can be the killer-application leveraged by Convergent billing;•Pre-paid and Post-paid accounts unified;•Service providers make a killing with Inter-connect billing, by using the state of the art Convergent Billing apps over those with older legacy billing systems;

Factors influencing Convergent Billing•Legacy Business Rules;• Regulations regarding content, M-commerce, Copyright issues );•Competitions and ensuring level-playing field;•Security and privacy issues;•Affordability and pricing issues;•New Technology, like 3G Mobile devices being used in place of ‘credit cards’;•Inter-connect issues;•Customer demands;•Economy of scale;

Convergent Billing in Ubiquitous Societies………

New Ubiquitous Societies•Advanced countries like Japan, South Korea, Singapore besides USA are fast moving towards an ‘ubiquitous network’society;•Always available and Everywhere network;

•Merging of wire-line/ wireless/ DSL/ OFC network infrastructure;

Research and deployment in the following field to synergize with the converged network/ services:- Microchip Network Technology; - Ubiquitous Network Authentication and Agent Technology; - Ubiquitous network control and management technology;

- Radio-frequency identification (RFID)

New Ubiquitous Societies

Real-time Event based billing:Each interactive device and activity can be billed in real-time, by using the robust features of the Convergent Billing Apps, based on volume, time, distance, quality of content and services or based on Event.

[email protected]

“I skate to where the puck is going to be, not to where it has been.”

-Wayne Gretzky

Convergent Billing

Documents

Transcript of Convergent Billing