So what do people think about adding the "call rate" to the CDR structure?? This would allow you to detail a call with the rate that was in affect for that call. When you come back later and do the billing for the customer you would have the actual per min rate in the record. I think this solves an issue when you have changing rates and multiple providers. If one provider is down, and you use a back up you can track the "rate" better. In fact as I type this, I think we should have cost_rate the rate you where charged for this call cust_rate the rate you charge your customer for this call or is their a better way to do this. john brown, ceo chagres technologies, inc (US) chagres technologies, BV (EMEA) opening soon Providers of VoIP hardware http://www.chagres.net/products/voip/
>So what do people think about adding the "call rate" to the CDR >structure?? > >This would allow you to detail a call with the rate that was >in affect for that call. When you come back later and do >the billing for the customer you would have the actual per min >rate in the record. > >I think this solves an issue when you have changing rates and >multiple providers. If one provider is down, and you use >a back up you can track the "rate" better. > >In fact as I type this, I think we should have > >cost_rate the rate you where charged for this call >cust_rate the rate you charge your customer for this call > > > >or is their a better way to do this. > > >john brown, ceo >chagres technologies, inc (US) >chagres technologies, BV (EMEA) opening soon >Providers of VoIP hardware >http://www.chagres.net/products/voip/ >This is already more-or-less supported with the custom variable fields in the CDR, and is awaiting integration into CVS. There are two versions of the patch: one that has multiple custom fields, and the second version that has only one field, into which you'll need to create your own separators (uuuuugly, but for some reason that was what was decided upon as the final version.) See http://bugs.digium.com/bug_view_page.php?bug_id=0000442 JT
I personally think the "right" place to deal with billing is in your billing application. Your billing application should know about special rates for different customers, time of day rates, destination rates, etc. There is already enough information in the CDR to know which provider you are going thru. i.e. fields 6 and 8 in the CDR logs. These are Call Detail Record logs, not Call Billing Logs. 8-) If your billing application can't handle this, it should be pretty easy to build a small preprocessing application for the log files. Why invent something new when you can reuse existing tools to do all or most of the job? On Sat, 2003-11-08 at 15:08, John Brown (CV) wrote:> So what do people think about adding the "call rate" to the CDR > structure?? > > This would allow you to detail a call with the rate that was > in affect for that call. When you come back later and do > the billing for the customer you would have the actual per min > rate in the record. > > I think this solves an issue when you have changing rates and > multiple providers. If one provider is down, and you use > a back up you can track the "rate" better. > > In fact as I type this, I think we should have > > cost_rate the rate you where charged for this call > cust_rate the rate you charge your customer for this call > > > > or is their a better way to do this. > > > john brown, ceo > chagres technologies, inc (US) > chagres technologies, BV (EMEA) opening soon > Providers of VoIP hardware > http://www.chagres.net/products/voip/ > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users-- Now with links to Unofficial Asterisk pages! http://www.digium.com/index.php?menu=documentation BTEL Consulting 504-899-1387 or 850-484-4545 or 877-677-9643
At 01:08 PM 11/8/2003, you wrote:>So what do people think about adding the "call rate" to the CDR >structure??Sounds great, but there's one problem. How does asterisk know what the current rate in effect is? I can think of several ways to do this, but they all involve some fairly significant C coding.>or is their a better way to do this.I just use a perl script. The CDR record tells me the number dialed and the channel that handled the far end of the call. Based on that I can tell which provider was used, what number was called, how long the call lasted and when the call was made. That's more than enough information to calculate rates. Parse that file once an hour/day and there you go. --Ernest
John, The only thing that should be in the call data record (CDR) is data about the call. You want to do all your rating of calls in the billing system. That way you offload the additional processing to a batch activity. You have enough data in the CDR to combine it with data in the billing system to generate bills and do P&L calculations (within certain limits of course). THX/BDH On Sat, 2003-11-08 at 16:08, John Brown (CV) wrote:> So what do people think about adding the "call rate" to the CDR > structure?? > > This would allow you to detail a call with the rate that was > in affect for that call. When you come back later and do > the billing for the customer you would have the actual per min > rate in the record. > > I think this solves an issue when you have changing rates and > multiple providers. If one provider is down, and you use > a back up you can track the "rate" better. > > In fact as I type this, I think we should have > > cost_rate the rate you where charged for this call > cust_rate the rate you charge your customer for this call > > > > or is their a better way to do this. > > > john brown, ceo > chagres technologies, inc (US) > chagres technologies, BV (EMEA) opening soon > Providers of VoIP hardware > http://www.chagres.net/products/voip/ > > _______________________________________________ > Asterisk-Users mailing list > Asterisk-Users@lists.digium.com > http://lists.digium.com/mailman/listinfo/asterisk-users >
Hi, At 15:30 8-11-2003 -0700, you wrote:>As rates change of the course of a month, it would be nice to >know what the rate was at the time of the call. > >some "detail records" :)Ofcourse you could enter the time/date of the call as a billing parameter. I do feel that post-analysis for this purpose is more usefull since you have to analyse which customer belongs to which channel etc. anyway. However, it is a matter of preferences I suppose :-)> > > john brown, ceo > > > chagres technologies, inc (US) > > > chagres technologies, BV (EMEA) opening soonCool, where ? Florian