Patent ID: 8000249

Claim:
A method for detecting and controlling traffic congestion in a wireless telecommunications system, said wireless telecommunications system comprising at least a first node including a Radio Base Station, RBS, and at least one second node including a Radio Network Controller, RNC, the wireless telecommunications system also comprising a Transport Network, TN, for conveying traffic between said first node and second node, in which wireless telecommunications system the traffic can comprise one or more flows, the method comprising: using one flow control function per each of said flows, said one flow control function comprising a congestion detection and control function, the congestion detection and control function acting to reduce the traffic on said flow; and initiating the congestion detection and control function for one of the controlled flows before the system becomes congested, where the one flow control function is located in the RNC and initiates the traffic reduction of the flow in response to Transport Network Layer Congestion Indication Frames, TCI, which are sent to the RBS by the RNC, where a TCI frame, which is previously defined as indicating congestion, is used to initiate traffic reduction before congestion occurs, and where three other types of congestion are indicated by the same TCI frame.