Patent ID: 7224774

Claim:
A method of controlling a telephone call to an instant messaging user, comprising the steps of: (a) receiving at a call server a call directed to the user; (b) identifying an instant messaging service used by the user; (c) sending an instant message to the user through the instant messaging service to offer the user one or more options for responding to the call, wherein said options are based on a profile of the user; (d) if no response is received from the user within a predetermined period of time, controlling the call as specified in a default option; and otherwise: (e) receiving an option selection from the user over the instant messaging service; and (f) controlling the call as specified in said selected option; wherein when the user selects an option to answer the call over the instant messaging service, the controlling step further comprises the steps of: (f1) if the instant messaging service is communicatively coupled to both a microphone and a speaker at the user's side, establishing an audio connection between the user and the caller; (f2) if the instant messaging service is not communicatively coupled to a speaker at the users side, establishing verbal-textual communication between the caller and the user by enabling speech-to-text software conversion; and (f3) if the instant messaging service is not communicatively coupled to both a microphone and a speaker at the user's side, establishing verbal-textual communication between the caller and the user by enabling speech-to-text and/or text-to-speech software conversion.