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TECHNICAL SPECIFICATION
User Group;
Quality of ICT Services;
Requirements for Check-up on Metering and
Billing Processes
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2 ETSI TS 102 845 V2.0.0 (2018-10)
Reference
RTS/USER-0050
Keywords
charging, quality, user
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3 ETSI TS 102 845 V2.0.0 (2018-10)
Contents
Intellectual Property Rights . 5
Foreword . 5
Modal verbs terminology . 5
Introduction . 5
1 Scope . 7
2 References . 7
2.1 Normative references . 7
2.2 Informative references . 8
3 Definitions of terms and abbreviations. 8
3.1 Terms . 8
3.2 Abbreviations . 10
4 Billing Chain and Risks . 11
4.1 Billing Chain . 11
4.2 Billing Model in Operational Area . 12
4.2.1 Billing model . 12
4.2.2 Configuration of Charging data and Billing Platforms . 13
4.3 Inherent risks in tariff plans complexity . 14
4.3.0 Inherent risks . 14
4.3.1 Bundles and bundle plans management . 14
4.3.2 Value-Added Services . 15
4.3.2.1 VAS billing risks . 15
4.3.2.2 Billing of Premium Rate and Content Services . 15
4.3.3 Temporary mobile offer and real time promotion . 15
4.3.4 Zero-rating . 16
4.3.5 Mobile Money . 16
5 Approach for Checking-up on Metering and Billing . 17
5.1 Billing Integrity Principles . 17
5.2 Process Approach . 17
5.3 Billing Error Rate . 17
6 Implementation Model . 17
7 Prerequisites . 18
7.0 General prerequisites . 18
7.1 Metering Rules Definition . 18
7.1.1 Definition of Successful and Unsuccessful Status . 18
7.1.2 Definition of Units . 19
7.1.3 Definition of Time . 19
7.1.4 Definition of Duration . 19
7.1.5 Definition of Data Volume . 19
7.1.6 Definition of Classes of Service . 19
7.1.7 Definition of Rounding Methods . 19
7.2 Tariff Information Documentation . 20
7.2.1 Tariff Scope . 20
7.2.2 Taxes Information . 21
7.2.3 Definition of Rounding Methods . 21
7.2.4 Definition of Publishing Modes . 21
8 Checking-up Process . 21
8.0 General principles. 21
8.1 Process Overview . 22
8.2 Test Campaign Design . 22
8.3 Test Resources Procurement . 23
8.4 Electronic Communications Technical Configuration . 24
ETSI
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4 ETSI TS 102 845 V2.0.0 (2018-10)
8.5 Electronic Communications Generation . 24
8.6 TCG Logs Collection . 24
8.7 Billing Details Collection . 24
8.8 Electronic Communications Rating and Matching . 25
8.9 Balance and Invoices checking . 25
8.10 Reporting . 25
8.11 Billing Error Rate Computation . 26
9 Test Methodology . 26
9.1 End-to-End Active Test . 26
9.1.0 End-to-end active test methodology . 26
9.1.1 Test Charging Generator . 26
9.1.2 User devices connected to TCG . 27
9.2 Test interfaces . 27
9.2.0 TCG interfaces . 27
9.2.1 Air interfaces . 27
9.2.2 Core interfaces . 27
9.3 Benefits of end-to-end test. 27
Annex A (informative): Example of a Stratified Sample of Electronic Communications . 29
A.1 General information . 29
A.2 Locations . 30
A.3 Networks . 30
A.4 Offers . 30
A.5 Services . 31
A.6 Durations . 31
A.7 Volumes . 32
A.8 Spreading . 32
A.9 Additional Variations . 32
Annex B (informative): Case Management & Corrective Actions Enforcement . 33
History . 34
ETSI
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5 ETSI TS 102 845 V2.0.0 (2018-10)
Intellectual Property Rights
Essential patents
IPRs essential or potentially essential to normative deliverables may have been declared to ETSI. The information
pertaining to these essential IPRs, if any, is publicly available for ETSI members and non-members, and can be found
in ETSI SR 000 314: "Intellectual Property Rights (IPRs); Essential, or potentially Essential, IPRs notified to ETSI in
respect of ETSI standards", which is available from the ETSI Secretariat. Latest updates are available on the ETSI Web
server (https://ipr.etsi.org/).
Pursuant to the ETSI IPR Policy, no investigation, including IPR searches, has been carried out by ETSI. No guarantee
can be given as to the existence of other IPRs not referenced in ETSI SR 000 314 (or the updates on the ETSI Web
server) which are, or may be, or may become, essential to the present document.
Trademarks
The present document may include trademarks and/or tradenames which are asserted and/or registered by their owners.
ETSI claims no ownership of these except for any which are indicated as being the property of ETSI, and conveys no
right to use or reproduce any trademark and/or tradename. Mention of those trademarks in the present document does
not constitute an endorsement by ETSI of products, services or organizations associated with those trademarks.
Foreword
This Technical Specification (TS) has been produced by ETSI User Group (USER).
Information and Communications Technology (ICT) standardization is part of the general standardization activities, and
contributes to policy objectives to improve the competitiveness of European industry, as specified in the Lisbon
strategy. The legal basis for European standardization and standardization policy, including the ICT domain, is
Directive 98/34/EC [i.8]. One of its main elements is the formal recognition of three European Standards Organisations
(ESOs), CEN, CENELEC and ETSI, active in various degrees in the ICT domain. Standards produced by the three
ESOs and resulting from an open consensus building process are by nature voluntary and non-binding technical
documents.
The standardization work described in the present document was funded by the European Commission, Enterprise and
Industry Directorate-General, as part of the 2009 ICT Standardization Work Programme and executed by ETSI.
The present document has been produced within the ETSI Special Committee USER GROUP (USER) by the Specialist
Task Force (STF) 375. Several documents provided by European Telecommunications regulatory bodies have been
used to develop the present document. They are detailed in ETSI TR 102 847 [i.7].
Modal verbs terminology
In the present document "shall", "shall not", "should", "should not", "may", "need not", "will", "will not", "can" and
"cannot" are to be interpreted as described in clause 3.2 of the ETSI Drafting Rules (Verbal forms for the expression of
provisions).
"must" and "must not" are NOT allowed in ETSI deliverables except when used in direct citation.
Introduction
The original motivation to produce present document was that a significant difference rate between theoretical and
actual bills had been identified by several parties in the current metering and billing processes operated by Service
Providers (operators). Several Service Providers, administrations and users associations have intended to reduce this
difference rate in implementing rules in order to make users more confident in the reliability of their bills.
ETSI
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6 ETSI TS 102 845 V2.0.0 (2018-10)
The telecommunications industry remains a fast-moving and complex ecosystem. The Service Providers are facing a
number of new challenges:
• Smart phone as fast-growing User platform to access applications and all digital services over mobile internet.
• Rapidly evolving new technologies, combining 5G and optical fibres, for migrating ultra-high speed networks.
• An underlying shift taking place: telecom providers are investing in media and content services, while media
and content service providers are investing in communications.
• Over-the-top (OTT) services becomes increasingly popular with Users, who demand higher-quality data
services and essentially increased traffic requirements on Service Providers.
The convergence of telecom services with media and technologies makes revenue assurance for Service Providers as a
necessary strategy with many potential opportunities for the substantial amounts of data flowing through their networks
by data propositions, pricing and charging mechanisms, in addition to the existing voice and SMS revenues. On the
other hand, those challenges increase the risks of billing errors and cause overcharging or undercharging for the Service
providers. From the User or Regulator view, overcharging and transparency in a bill are of paramount importance.
Nevertheless, due to the complexity of this issue and in absence of any available formal standard in this area, the current
practices are hindered by significant limitations. The purpose of the present document is to fulfil the gaps of the current
practices, in order to provide a reference that can be used for a continuous and trustworthy checking up on metering and
billing processes. Such a checking is expected to contribute to a continuous quality of service improvement on metering
and billing processes.
In order to provide evidence that metering and billing verification is conducted according to the present document, it
will be useful for a Service Provider to have its verification process audited by an independent party, that will formally
assess the conformity of its checking-up on metering and billing with the technical specification. Therefore, the present
document is inevitable not only for protecting User, for assuring revenues of Service Provider, but also for Regulatory
Authority in monitoring accuracy of all charges of consumers when using the regulated services.
The purpose of ETSI TS 102 846 [1] is to define when, how and by whom the conformity assessment audit is
conducted. Such a conformity assessment is expected to contribute to an increased trust by Service Providers,
customers, regulators and other stakeholders that metering and billing processes are reasonably monitored.
ETSI
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7 ETSI TS 102 845 V2.0.0 (2018-10)
1 Scope
The present document has been prepared to provide a model for designing and operating the checking-up on metering
and billing processes of Service Providers.
Because the checking-up approach of the present document is end-to-end (i.e. using a "black box" approach from the
actual electronic communications generation to the checking-up on their billing), it is intended that these requirements
are applicable to the metering and billing of any kind of services offered by the Service Providers.
The goal of the present document is to define a standardized checking process and the test methodology that could be
implemented by any stakeholder and is auditable by a third-party, leading to trustworthy performance indicators about
the integrity of billing issued by a Service Provider.
NOTE: It is important to note that the present document does not provide any model for designing and operating
the metering and billing process itself.
2 References
2.1 Normative references
References are either specific (identified by date of publication and/or edition number or version number) or
non-specific. For specific references, only the cited version applies. For non-specific references, the latest version of the
referenced document (including any amendments) applies.
Referenced documents which are not found to be publicly available in the expected location might be found at
https://docbox.etsi.org/Reference/.
NOTE: While any hyperlinks included in this clause were valid at the time of publication, ETSI cannot guarantee
their long term validity.
The following referenced documents are necessary for the application of the present document.
[1] ETSI TS 102 846: "User Group; Quality of ICT Services; Requirements for Bodies Providing
Conformity Assessment of Checking-up on Metering and Billing Processes".
[2] BIPM: "The International System of Units (SI)".
[3] ETSI TS 122 115: "Technical Specification Digital cellular telecommunications system
(Phase 2+); Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS); LTE; Telecommunication
management; Service aspects; Charging and billing (3GPP TS 22.115)".
[4] ETSI TS 132 240: "Technical Specification Digital cellular telecommunications system
(Phase 2+); Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS); LTE; Telecommunication
management; Charging management; Charging architecture and principles (3GPP TS 32.240)".
[5] ETSI TS 132 260: "Technical Specification Digital cellular telecommunications system
(Phase 2+); Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS); LTE; Telecommunication
management; Charging management; IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) charging
(3GPP TS 32.260)".
[6] ETSI TS 132 295: "Technical Specification Digital cellular telecommunications system
(Phase 2+); Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS); LTE; Telecommunication
management; Charging management; Charging Data Record (CDR) transfer (3GPP TS 32.295)".
[7] ETSI TS 132 297: "Technical Specification Digital cellular telecommunications system
(Phase 2+); Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS); LTE; Telecommunication
management; Charging management; Charging Data Record (CDR) file format and transfer
(3GPP TS 32.297)".
[8] IEEE 802.11™-2012: "Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY)
specifications".
ETSI
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8 ETSI TS 102 845 V2.0.0 (2018-10)
2.2 Informative references
References are either specific (identified by date of publication and/or edition number or version number) or
non-specific. For specific references, only the cited version applies. For non-specific references, the latest version of the
referenced document (including any amendments) applies.
NOTE: While any hyperlinks included in this clause were valid at the time of publication, ETSI cannot guarantee
their long term validity.
The following referenced documents are not necessary for the application of the present document but they assist the
user with regard to a particular subject area.
[i.1] ETSI EG 202 057-2: "Speech Processing, Transmission and Quality Aspects (STQ); User related
QoS parameter definitions and measurements; Part 2: Voice telephony, Group 3 fax, modem data
services and SMS".
[i.2] ETSI EG 202 057-3: "Speech Processing, Transmission and Quality Aspects (STQ); User related
QoS parameter definitions and measurements; Part 3: QoS parameters specific to Public Land
Mobile Networks (PLMN)".
[i.3] ETSI EG 202 057-4: "Speech Processing, Transmission and Quality Aspects (STQ); User related
QoS parameter definitions and measurements; Part 4: Internet access".
[i.4] ETSI EG 202 765-2: "Speech Processing, Transmission and Quality Aspects (STQ); QoS and
network performance metrics and measurement methods Part 2: Transmission Quality Indicator
combining Voice Quality Metrics".
[i.5] ETSI ES 202 765-4: "Speech and multimedia Transmission Quality (STQ); QoS and network
performance metrics and measurement methods; Part 4: Indicators for supervision of Multiplay
services".
[i.7] ETSI TR 102 847: "User Group; Quality of ICT Services; Standardization and regulation
references in the Metering and Billing area".
[i.8] Directive 98/34/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 22 June 1998 laying down a
procedure for the provision of information in the field of technical standards and regulations.
[i.8] ETSI ETR 037: "Network Aspects (NA); Telecommunications Management Network (TMN);
Objectives, principles, concepts and reference configurations".
3 Definitions of terms and abbreviations
3.1 Terms
For the purposes of the present document, the following terms apply:
billing error rate: for a set of electronic communications, the ratio of the total number of electronic communications
having breached at least one of the billing integrity principles divided by the total number of electronic communications
in the set
billing integrity principles: principles that should be fulfilled to state that the billing activity of a Service Provider is
correct
Billing Verification Body (BVB): organization that has skills and methods to conduct the checking-up on metering and
billing processes of a Service Provider
NOTE: The Billing Verification Body can be internal (i.e. a department of the Service Provider) or external (i.e. a
specialized company to which the Service Provider has outsourced the check-up on metering and billing).
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9 ETSI TS 102 845 V2.0.0 (2018-10)
Charging Data Record (CDR): Record generated by a Core Network Element for the purpose of billing a subscriber
for the provided service. It includes fields identifying the user, the session and the Network Elements as well as
information on the network resources and services used to support a subscriber session.
NOTE 1: In the traditional circuit domain, CDR has been used to denote "Call Detail Record", which is subsumed
by "Charging Data Record" hereafter [5].
NOTE 2: For each party to be charged for parts of or all charges of a chargeable event a separate CDR is generated,
i.e. more than one CDR may be generated for a single chargeable event, e.g. because of its long duration,
or because more than one charged party is to be charged.
checking-up on metering and billing: activities used to verify how strongly a Service Provider metering and billing
activities complies with billing integrity principles
continuous: characteristics of an approach that takes into consideration the constantly evolving nature of
communications networks and follows a "back-to-back" principle to verify metering and billing
NOTE: Because metering and billing processes and systems evolve on a continuous basis (incidence and update),
the verification of billing has to evolve accordingly and to check the billing integrity on a similar way.
"Continuous basis" excludes "one shot audit approach" where verification is performed once a year or
once per quarter.
customer: user who is responsible for payment for the electronic co
...