Method for managing wireless communication device use including optimizing rate and service plan selection
First Claim
1. A method for creating communication service plan recommendations for a client for selection of a service plan from a communication service provider, comprising:
- accessing billing files in a memory device to identify a client communication device, wherein the billing files include call detail records from one or more of the communication service providers for calls made with the client communication device;
determining average usage of the client communication device based on the call detail records over an analysis period;
creating a list of service plans available from communication service providers for the client communication device;
calculating a plan cost for each of the service plans on the list for the client communication device based on the determined average usage; and
generating a recommendation report including at least a portion of the service plans on the list arranged in order of calculated plan cost.
4 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A wireless account management system including an account manager system, customer systems, and carrier systems linked by the Internet. The account manager system includes a management tool adapted with a data loader for receiving billing and usage data from the carrier systems and converting it to a single format for storage in a management database. The data loader allows carrier system data having a similar format but differing data arrangement, carrier system data having different formats, and carrier system data having a format not readily parsed all to be processed and parsed into files having a single format. Plaintext files are parsed by a text parser and carrier-specific files are parsed by modules provided to interpret corresponding carrier'"'"'s bills. An optimization engine uses usage reports created from call detail records, lists of available service plans, and customer-provided and carrier-specific criteria to create plan recommendations for each wireless device.
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Citations
24 Claims
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1. A method for creating communication service plan recommendations for a client for selection of a service plan from a communication service provider, comprising:
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accessing billing files in a memory device to identify a client communication device, wherein the billing files include call detail records from one or more of the communication service providers for calls made with the client communication device;
determining average usage of the client communication device based on the call detail records over an analysis period;
creating a list of service plans available from communication service providers for the client communication device;
calculating a plan cost for each of the service plans on the list for the client communication device based on the determined average usage; and
generating a recommendation report including at least a portion of the service plans on the list arranged in order of calculated plan cost. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10)
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11. A method of processing communications billing data to facilitate analysis, comprising:
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receiving input data comprising billing and usage information for communication devices serviced by a communications service provider;
determining whether the input data is in a difficult-to-parse format or in a more-readily-parsable format;
if determined in a difficult-to-parse format;
converting the input data into a text file; and
processing the text file with a text parser into a single format output file; and
if determined in a more-readily-parsable format;
transferring the input data to one of plurality of parser modules adapted for parsing billing and usage information from a particular communications service provider, the one parser module corresponding to the service communication provider that is the source of the received input data; and
processing the input data with the one parser module into an output file having the single format. - View Dependent Claims (12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20)
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21. A method in a computer system for managing wireless communication device usage for a client, comprising:
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storing employee information, device information, and existing carrier and carrier service plan information received from the client, wherein the employee information is linked to device information indicating an employee assigned to use a device and wherein the existing carrier and carrier plan information is linked to the device information indicating for each device an existing carrier and carrier service plan;
processing billing information from the existing carriers to determine usage for the devices based on call detail records in the billing information;
determining a set of preferred service plans from a set of available service plans for each of the devices based on the determined usage; and
providing requesting users differing levels of access to the determined set of preferred service plans and the stored information based on a previously-assigned user access level. - View Dependent Claims (22, 23, 24)
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Specification