Patent ID: 7164759

Claim:
A method of categorizing and prioritizing a phone call to a call recipient's phone number, the method comprising the steps of: defining a set of rules for handling a phone call placed by an anonymous caller to the call recipient's phone, wherein the set of rules are selected among a group of rules comprising full access, time frame limited access, date limited access, route to phone mail, block call, route to third party, and route call if call recipient's calling plan has sufficient time remaining; assigning a plurality of codes, each code uniquely assigned to one of the set of rules; receiving a call containing one of the plurality of codes which is appended by the anonymous caller to the call recipient's phone number; and routing the call in accordance with a rule belonging to the set of rules and uniquely corresponding to the appended code, wherein the routing is based solely on the appended code independent of an identity of the anonymous caller and a calling line over which the phone call is placed; wherein the routing is performed using a rules engine that can be pre-programmed by the call recipient to route calls in accordance with the set of rules by at least: (i) recognizing a trusted-caller code and causing the call recipient's phone to ring in response to a call to which the trusted-caller code is appended, (ii) recognizing a time-frame code and causing a call to the recipient's phone to be blocked when the call is not received within a predetermined time-fame, (iii) recognizing a date-limited code and causing a call to the recipient's phone to be blocked when the call is not received within a predetermined range of dates, and (iv) recognizing a call-transfer code and causing a call to the recipient's phone to be routed to one of a voice-mail processor and a third-party phone number designated by the recipient.