Answers
What Is Billing Mediation in Telecom?
Billing mediation is the processing layer between the network and the billing system. It collects raw usage records (CDRs) from network elements and partners, checks them, removes duplicates, joins partial records, converts them into one consistent format, adds the business context the network does not know, and passes clean usage to rating, billing and every other system that needs it. If a record is lost or corrupted between the network and the invoice, it usually happened in mediation, or because there was no mediation.
3GPP standardises how the network produces charging records and hands them over, but not what happens after. Its specifications describe the receiving side simply as the billing domain, which may be a billing system or a mediation device. Mediation is where operator-specific logic lives.
What mediation does, step by step
Records that fail a step go to an error or suspense queue, where they are fixed and reprocessed rather than silently dropped. How that queue is managed is one of the clearest signs of a well-run mediation setup.
| Step | What happens | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Collection | Pull or receive CDR files and feeds from every source: packet gateways, voice and SMS platforms, IMS, partner networks, roaming | A missed file is missed revenue |
| Decoding | Convert binary formats such as ASN.1 into readable fields | Raw network records cannot be priced as delivered |
| Validation | Reject or quarantine records with missing or impossible values | Bad records should not reach an invoice |
| Deduplication | Drop records received more than once | Duplicates overcharge customers and inflate usage |
| Correlation | Join partial records from long sessions, and records from different network elements, into one chargeable event | A data session split into 40 partial records has to be priced as one |
| Normalisation | Map every source into one schema: same field names, units, time zone, identifiers | Downstream systems can then treat all usage the same way |
| Enrichment | Add account, plan, customer type, tax jurisdiction and other business data | The network knows the SIM, not the customer's plan |
| Filtering and routing | Send each record to the systems that need it: rating and billing, reconciliation, fraud, analytics | Different consumers need different subsets |
Where revenue leaks in mediation
Most mediation losses are ordinary, not dramatic:
- Missing files. A transfer fails and nobody notices. 3GPP CDR files carry a sequence number in the header, so gaps are detectable if someone checks.
- Unmatched records. Usage arrives for a SIM that mediation cannot link to an account, often because provisioning and billing are out of step. It sits in suspense and is never billed.
- Partial records never closed. A session's final record is missing, so the correlated event is never completed.
- Duplicates. The same file is resent after a failure and processed twice.
- Time zone and cut-off errors. Usage lands in the wrong billing period or the wrong tariff window.
Practical controls
Practical controls are simple: reconcile file sequence numbers, compare record counts and volume totals at each stage against the source, and review suspense queues on a schedule rather than when a customer complains.
Do you still need mediation with real-time charging?
Yes, though its role changes. When an online charging system prices usage in real time, the price is decided before the CDR exists, so mediation is no longer the step that makes usage billable. It is still needed for everything offline: postpaid detail, partner and wholesale records, roaming files, reconciliation, analytics and regulatory retention. Mediation shifts from being the gateway to billing to being the single source of clean usage data for the whole business.
Billing mediation for MVNOs
For an MVNO, mediation has a second job beyond billing. The host network operator both sends the MVNO its usage records and invoices the MVNO for the same usage. Mediation produces the MVNO's own view of what was used, and that view is the evidence for checking the wholesale invoice.
That creates a few MVNO-specific requirements:
- Host feed handling. CDRs arrive in the host's format, on the host's schedule, often as files over SFTP or through an API. Formats and delivery can change when the host upgrades systems.
- Two sides of the margin. The same usage has to be priced twice: at retail for the subscriber, and at wholesale rates to predict and check the host's invoice.
- Timeliness. The later records arrive, the later you find a problem, often after the wholesale invoice is already due.
TelcoEdge MI Connector
TelcoEdge's MI Connector takes CDRs from an existing setup by MNO API feed, SFTP or scheduled FTP, for operators that want margin analysis on top of the BSS they already run.
Related Pages
FAQs
Is mediation part of the BSS?
Usually yes. Some operators run a standalone mediation platform, others use mediation built into their BSS. What matters is that the functions above exist somewhere and are monitored.
What is the difference between mediation and rating?
Mediation prepares usage records. Rating prices them. Mediation answers "what happened, and which account does it belong to?" Rating answers "what does it cost under this customer's plan?"
What is real-time mediation?
Mediation that processes records continuously as they arrive rather than in scheduled batches. It shortens the time between usage and visibility, which matters for fraud detection, usage alerts and spotting a broken feed within minutes rather than the next day.