Patent ID: 8467349

Claim:
A method for providing in-order delivery of data packets during handoff in a communication network, comprising: receiving data packets at a target network entity; prioritizing a transmission order of the received data packets at the target network entity, wherein the prioritizing comprises at least one of a first prioritization or a second prioritization, wherein the first prioritization comprises prioritizing Layer 2 (L2) data packets received from a source network entity and destined for transmission to an Access Terminal (AT) over any received Layer 3 (L3) data packets destined for transmission to the AT, wherein the second prioritization comprises prioritizing L3 data packets received from the source network entity and destined for transmission to the AT over L3 data packets received from an Access GateWay (AGW) and destined for transmission to the AT, wherein the target network entity is enabled to perform the first prioritization and the second prioritization; and transmitting, at the target network entity, the received data packets according to the at least one of the first prioritization or the second prioritization.