A soft switch for controlling transmission of data across a packet-switched network (112, 200), wherein: the soft switch comprising means configured to receive signaling information (2302, 2316, 2326, 2338) associated with data received at a first media gateway (228, 232, 238) from a carrier facility, wherein the signaling information (2302, 2316, 2326, 2338) includes a first identifier corresponding to a particular carrier facility and a second identifier corresponding to an intended destination for the data; the soft switch comprises a processor configured to perform the operations of: referencing a configuration database using the first identifier in order to select therefrom call processing information specifically defined for the particular carrier facility, wherein the call processing information specifies provisioning instructions for transmitting data received from the particular carrier facility across the packet-switched network (112, 200); and referencing a routing database using at least the second identifier to select therefrom routing instructions for use in selecting a second media gateway (230, 234, 240) for egressing the data from the packet-switch network (112, 200); and the soft switch comprising means configured to transmit a command message to the first media gateway (228, 232, 238) to initiate the transmission of the data across the packet-switched network (112, 200) in accordance with at least the provisioning instructions and the routing instructions. the soft switch comprising means configured to receive signaling information (2302, 2316, 2326, 2338) associated with data received at a first media gateway (228, 232, 238) from a carrier facility, wherein the signaling information (2302, 2316, 2326, 2338) includes a first identifier corresponding to a particular carrier facility and a second identifier corresponding to an intended destination for the data; the soft switch comprises a processor configured to perform the operations of: referencing a configuration database using the first identifier in order to select therefrom call processing information specifically defined for the particular carrier facility, wherein the call processing information specifies provisioning instructions for transmitting data received from the particular carrier facility across the packet-switched network (112, 200); and referencing a routing database using at least the second identifier to select therefrom routing instructions for use in selecting a second media gateway (230, 234, 240) for egressing the data from the packet-switch network (112, 200); and referencing a configuration database using the first identifier in order to select therefrom call processing information specifically defined for the particular carrier facility, wherein the call processing information specifies provisioning instructions for transmitting data received from the particular carrier facility across the packet-switched network (112, 200); and referencing a routing database using at least the second identifier to select therefrom routing instructions for use in selecting a second media gateway (230, 234, 240) for egressing the data from the packet-switch network (112, 200); and the soft switch comprising means configured to transmit a command message to the first media gateway (228, 232, 238) to initiate the transmission of the data across the packet-switched network (112, 200) in accordance with at least the provisioning instructions and the routing instructions.