Monday's Guest Post: PCRF and Charging systems Integration Approaches

   
A new guest post will be published on Monday. In his article, "Policy and Charging: The Value of Independence", my 10th guest, Doug Suriano, will discuss the integration of the policy server with charging and billing systems, that is emerging as one of the key considerations in the 3GPP Policy and Charging Control architecture.

This architecture specifies several interfaces – Gx, Gy or Gz – to online and offline charging systems through the policy and charging enforcement function. However, the 3GPP doesn’t define how to implement this integration. As a consequence, vendors and service providers have pursued a variety of approaches.

Integration between policy and charging systems is required to charge for services based on subscriber entitlements. Both multi- and single-vendor implementations can support this integration. However, a single-vendor platform that pre-integrates policy and charging functions can ultimately limit a service provider’s choices, flexibility, scalability, signaling efficiency and time-to-market for new services.

Stay tuned.

If you like to propose a guest post, please send me a proposed subject, abstract and the author details.