Personalized telephone announcement

• US 20030026416A1
• Filed: 08/01/2001
• Published: 02/06/2003
• Est. Priority Date: 08/01/2001
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Qwest Communications International Incorporated (Lumen Technologies, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Qwest Communications International Incorporated (Lumen Technologies, Inc.)
• Inventors: Fusco, Marc E.
• Granted Patent: US 7,224,792 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 379/374.02
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 1/578 associated with a synthesized vocal announcement
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 2242/22 Automatic class or number identification arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/42042 Notifying the called party of information on the calling party details within substation equipment H04M1/57, signalling details H04Q3/72
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/42059 Making use of the calling party identifier
• CPC Class Codes: H04M 3/4872 Non-interactive information services

Abstract

According to the invention, a method for alerting a user of an incoming phone call is disclosed. In one step, notification of the incoming phone call is received with an identifier that is associated with the incoming phone call. The identifier associated with the incoming phone call is detected. The identifier is correlated with a pre-recorded voice announcement and the pre-recorded voice announcement is played.

Claims

1. A method for alerting a user of an incoming phone call, the method comprising steps of:

receiving notification of the incoming phone call with an identifier associated with the incoming phone call;

detecting the identifier associated with the incoming phone call;

correlating the identifier with a pre-recorded voice announcement; and

playing the pre-recorded voice announcement.

2. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 1, further comprising a step of receiving the pre-recorded announcement for each phone call.

3. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 1, wherein the step of correlating the identifier comprises at least one of the following steps:

correlating a phone number with a pre-recorded voice announcement;

correlating a portion of the phone number with a pre-recorded voice announcement; and

correlating a caller ID name with a pre-recorded voice announcement.

4. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 1, further comprising steps of:

recording the pre-recorded voice announcement; and

receiving a selection that helps correlates the pre-recorded voice announcement to the identifier.

5. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 4, further comprising a step of storing the pre-recorded voice announcement with consumer phone equipment.

6. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 1, further comprising a step of interrupting a phone call to play the pre-recorded voice announcement.

7. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 1, wherein the playing step comprises playing the pre-recorded voice announcement with an earpiece.

8. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 1.

9. A method for alerting a user of an incoming phone call, the method comprising steps of:

recording a voice announcement;

receiving a selection that helps correlate the pre-recorded voice announcement to an identifier;

receiving notification of the incoming phone call that indicates the identifier associated with the incoming phone call;

detecting the identifier associated with the incoming phone call;

correlating the identifier with a voice announcement; and

playing the voice announcement.

10. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 9, further comprising a step of receiving the announcement for each phone call.

11. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 9, wherein the step of correlating the identifier comprises at least one of the following steps:

correlating a phone number with a voice announcement;

correlating a portion of the phone number with a voice announcement; and

correlating a caller ID name with a voice announcement.

12. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 9, further comprising a step of storing the voice announcement with consumer phone equipment.

13. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 9, further comprising a step of interrupting a phone call to play the voice announcement.

14. The method for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 9, wherein the playing step comprises playing the voice announcement with a speaker separate from an earpiece.

15. A computer-readable medium having computer-executable instructions for alerting the user of the incoming phone call as recited in claim 9.

16. Telephone equipment for announcing phone calls with a pre-recorded voice announcement, the telephone equipment comprising:

a sound digitizer that converts a sound to the pre-recorded voice announcement;

a caller ID function that detects an identifier associated with an incoming phone call;

a correlator that associates the identifier with the pre-recorded voice announcement; and

a speaker that plays the pre-recorded voice announcement after the pre-recorded voice announcement is correlated to the identifier.

17. The telephone equipment for announcing phone calls with a pre-recorded voice announcement as recited in claim 16, further comprising an announcement storage database that stores the pre-recorded voice announcement.

18. The telephone equipment for announcing phone calls with a pre-recorded voice announcement as recited in claim 16, wherein the announcement storage database is remotely located with respect to a location of the speaker.

19. The telephone equipment for announcing phone calls with a pre-recorded voice announcement as recited in claim 16, further comprising a web interface for receiving at least one of a criterion and a voice announcement.

20. The equipment for announcing phone calls with a pre-recorded voice announcement as recited in claim 16, wherein an earpiece comprises the speaker.