JPH04157958A - Charging device or management device of fee for telephone call - Google Patents

Abstract

PURPOSE:To prevent trouble of a fee by selecting a fee system and always using a charging pulse of NTT standards at the time of dialing from a pink public telephone where plural fee systems are stored. CONSTITUTION:When a coin is thrown into a pink public telephone set 3, a tone from a telephone trunk line 1 is heard. When a telephone number is dialed, intervals of the charging pulse to be sent to the telephone set 3 by a pulse generating circuit 8 and the number to be sent to the trunk line 1 are determined. Not only the fee system of NTT standards but also plural fee systems of telephone companies are stored in a RAM 17. The number of a company of low fee is added to dial pulses and is sent to the trunk line 1. Thus, trouble does not occur because the user of the pink public telephone pays the same fee for the telephone call as a general public telephone set, and the owner of the pink public telephone set obtains the difference in fee as profits.

Description

[Detailed Description of the Invention] [Industrial Application Field] The present invention relates to a call charge billing device or a call charge management device that sends billing pulses to a telephone with a charge collection function called a so-called pink telephone. .

[Prior Art] A telephone with a charge collection function, generally called a pink telephone, connects to a telephone line when the handset is raised and a charge is inserted, and the charge pulse sent from the central office through the telephone line at predetermined intervals collects information within the telephone. The fee is collected by dropping the coins into the collector one after another.

[Problem to be solved by the invention] However, the above conventional examples are often installed in restaurants and public facilities for customer service, and all usage charges are collected by the telephone company and the installer does not have to pay anything. There is no financial gain.

[Means for Solving the Problems] The present invention provides an accommodation means capable of accommodating a telephone with a charge collection function, a storage means for storing a plurality of charge systems, and when a dial number from the housed telephone is detected, A selective calling means that selects one of the plurality of fee structures stored above and makes a call using the dial number corresponding to the selected fee structure; By providing a sending means for sending charging pulses to the housed telephone according to the charge system, the standard charge is charged to the public telephone regardless of the charge to be paid to the telephone company.

[Function] According to the above configuration, users of pink telephones can be made to pay the same call charges as ordinary public telephones.

[Embodiments] Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail based on embodiments shown in the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing an embodiment of the present invention. In the figure, 1 is the telephone office line, 3 is the pink telephone (
The pink telephone 3 is designed to cause inserted coins to fall into a bill collector using billing pulses sent from a telephone line 11 at predetermined time intervals.

The telephone usage fee billing device 2 connects the telephone office line L and the pink telephone 3.
is established between. Each circuit and each switch in the billing device 2 is controlled by a control circuit 15.

A control program and necessary data for control by the control circuit 15 are stored in a ROM (read only memory) 16 and a RAM (random access memory) 17, respectively. And, as shown in Figure 2, ROM1
6 is a flowchart of the control program of the control circuit 15 stored in the control circuit 6, and the operation of the billing device 2 will be explained below according to this flowchart.

The control program shown in the flowchart of FIG. 2 is started to be executed when the charging device 2 is powered on. When the power is turned on, the control circuit 15 initializes the billing device 2. That is, the DC loop of the DC loop forming circuit 4 is opened (Sl), the switch 5 is turned to the A side, and the switch 9 is turned to the B side (S2). Subsequently, the calling signal from the telephone office line 1 is monitored (S3) and the off-hook (formation of a DC loop) of the pink telephone 3 is monitored (S4).

In the case of a call from the pink telephone 3, when the handset of the pink telephone 3 is raised and a coin is inserted, a DC loop is detected by the DC loop detection circuit IO. When this DC loop is detected (S4), the control circuit 15 causes the DC loop forming circuit 4 to form a DC loop for the telephone office line l (35), and the voice from the telephone office line l is transmitted to the pink telephone 3.
Connect audibly. Subsequently, the control circuit 15
When the dial detection circuit 7 detects a dial from the pink telephone 3, the pulse generating circuit 8 determines the charging pulse interval to be sent to the pink telephone 3 and the telephone number to be sent to the telephone office line 1.

The RAM 17 stores the rate systems of multiple telephone companies based on dial pulses from the pink telephone 3.
Determine the charging pulse interval to be sent. Further, the control circuit 15 selects a cheaper rate system from among the rate systems stored in the RAM 17 based on the dial pulse from the pink telephone 3, and dials the number of the telephone company of that rate system from the pink telephone 3. In addition to the pulse, telephone office line 1
Send to.

Note that the control circuit 15 takes into account the current time and weekday holidays when referring to the RAM 17. This is because the price may change depending on this information.

Then, it waits for a response from the other party (S7). It should be noted that the dial from the pink telephone 3 is designed so that it is not sent directly to the telephone office line 1 by the pulse removal circuit 21. Alternatively, if the pink telephone 3 is on-hook before the other party answers, the system returns to the initial state (S13).

- On the other hand, when the control circuit 15 detects the response of the other party by the response/disconnection detection circuit 12 (S7), the pulse generation circuit 8
The first billing pulse is sent to the pink telephone 3 through the telephone line 11, and the frequency (or charge) is displayed on the display device 19. Thereafter, according to the calculated standard charging pulse interval, periodic charging pulses are sent to the pink telephone 3 and the frequency (or charge) is displayed (S8, S9). The transmission of this billing pulse and the display of the frequency (or charge) are performed when the DC loop detection circuit IO detects that the pink telephone 3 has been put on hook due to the handset of the pink telephone 3 being put down or the end of coins. Alternatively, the process continues until the other party's disconnection is detected by the response/disconnection detection circuit 12.

After the pink telephone 3 goes on-hook or the other party is disconnected (310, 311), the call charge is printed out by the printer 20 (312), and the system returns to the initial state.

In the case of an incoming call from the telephone office line 1, when the ringing signal detection circuit 14 detects a ringing signal (S3), the control circuit 15 turns the switch 9 to the A side (S14) to connect the telephone office line 1 and the pink telephone 3. , so that the ringing signal flows to the pink telephone 3. Then, set the timer (S15
), monitor the off-hook of pink telephone 3 (S16)
This timer is a soft timer on the RAM 17, and is used to enter communication mode if the pink telephone 3 does not respond for a certain period of time or more.

The timeout is monitored in S19. When the pink telephone 3 goes off-hook before the timer times out (S16), the on-hook of the pink telephone 3 is monitored, and the initial state is returned to when the pink telephone 3 goes on-hook (318). If a timeout occurs before the pink telephone 3 goes off-hook (31.9), or if an operation to enter the communication mode is performed by the input unit 18 after the pink telephone 3 goes off-hook (SI6), the control circuit 15 A DC loop is formed using the loop forming circuit 4 (S20). Then, the switch 5 is turned to the B side to connect the telephone office line 1 to the communication circuit 13 (521), the switch 9 is turned to the B position, the pink telephone 3 is disconnected from the telephone office line 1, and the communication mode is entered (S22). This communication mode communicates according to a certain protocol, and the RAM17
Update the fee structure data stored in .

Note that the billing pulse sending interval is changed according to the value preset by the input circuit 18 (for example, 90
If set to %, NTT billing pulse interval or 10
If it is calculated as seconds, billing pulses are sent out at 9 second intervals.

), and it is also possible to set up a mote that does not send billing pulses, connect a cordless phone, etc., and create a service where you can later bill the charges in bulk based on the printed call charges. It is.

[Effects of the Invention] As is clear from the above explanation, according to the present invention, users of pink telephones pay the same call charges as ordinary public telephones, so troubles do not occur, and the users of pink telephones This has the excellent effect of allowing the installer to make a profit from the difference in charges.

[Brief explanation of drawings]

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a telephone billing device embodying the present invention, and FIG. 2 is a flowchart showing the control procedure of the control circuit 15 shown in FIG. 2... Telephone usage fee charging device 3... Pink telephone 6... Time cell sending circuit 7-... Dial detection circuit 8... Pulse generation circuit 13... Communication circuit 15... Control circuit 16. ...ROM 17...RAM 18...Input circuit 19...Display device 20...Printer

Claims (2)

[Claims] (1) A storage means capable of accommodating a telephone with a charge collection function; a storage means for storing a plurality of charge systems; and a means for storing a telephone with a charge collection function; Select
selective calling means for making a call with a dial number according to the selected rate system; and a sending unit for sending billing pulses to the accommodated telephone according to the standard rate system, regardless of the rate system selected by the selective calling unit. What is claimed is: 1. A call charge billing device comprising means. (2) It has a storage means for storing the call charge structure and a means for managing the call charge based on the stored call charge structure, and updates the storage means by receiving the call charge structure from the communication line. A call charge management device characterized by: