Patent ID: 8195566

Claim:
A software system digitally encoded in at least one non-transitory machine readable medium configured to be usable by at least one machine for use in providing a web service interface for a billing service, wherein a plurality of billing functions is provided by said billing service to computing applications residing on one or more computing devices in a distributed network, the software system comprising: a. a web service interface, which is implemented within software stored on a non-transitory computer readable medium, defined for a billing service, said web service interface being adapted for coupling to a billing engine, said billing engine residing on a computing device in said distributed network and being adapted to perform said plurality of billing functions, said web service interface comprises a plurality of application programming interfaces, each of said application programming interfaces being associated with one of said billing functions and being implemented such that the billing function associated therewith is performed after a web service invocation that commands performance of said billing function is received by said web service interface; and b. a plurality of object classes which are implemented within software stored on a non-transitory computer readable medium, each of said object classes defining objects for storing data utilized by said billing engine and for communicating said data to said billing engine through at least one implemented application programming interface of said web service interface, said web service interface being used to provide said billing service as a web service that is configured to be invoked by said computing applications in said distributed network.