A simple approach to charging and billing of packetized applications [next generation mobile networks]

Pricing the future services in next generation mobile networks will play a key role from the operator point of view to achieve the maximum revenue and utilization rate. Moreover, pricing these services is a very important issue to users since the acceptance of the services is directly related to the quality of service (QoS) offered to their subscribers. Network operators who provide different wireless services face two major challenges: (1) social welfare maximization; and (2) price determination. In this article, we focus on proposing a simple and robust charging approach for wireless applications. We aim to publish a unit price for each wireless product class taking into account the issues of social welfare maximization and price determination. When compared with the flat-rate model, where the fee is fixed and does not vary with the actual usage of the bandwidth, the suggested solution is able to provide a better quality of service to the users as well as greater revenue to the network operator.