Patent ID: 7564793

Claim:
A method for effecting a communication between subscribers of an enterprise network, comprising: (a) providing geographically dislocated first and second network regions of an enterprise network, the first and second network regions being in communication with one another through first and second networks and respectively comprising first and second gateways and first and second groupings of trunks connected to one of the first and second networks, wherein each of the first and second groupings comprise a plurality of trunks and wherein a common electronic address is associated with the second grouping of trunks; (b) the first network region receiving, from a first subscriber, a request to initiate an at least substantially real-time communication session with a second subscriber in the second network region, the request comprising a first electronic address identifying the second subscriber; (c) the first network region transmitting the common electronic address to the second network region in an outgoing communication; and (d) after the outgoing communication is answered by the second network region, transmitting in band with the outgoing communication to the second network region a unique identifier, wherein the identifier is used to establish the communication session with the second subscriber and wherein the bearer path for the session is over the network used to transmit the outgoing communication and unique identifier, wherein the identifier is a user identifier associated with a phantom user, wherein the common electronic address and first electronic address are each telephone numbers, wherein the substantially real-time communication session is a live voice call, wherein a first phantom user is determined for the first network region and a second phantom user is determined for the second network region, wherein the user identifier transmitted to the second network region is the first phantom user identifier, wherein a first communication-related data structure is associated with the inter-region call, wherein a second communication-related data structure is associated with the outgoing call and the first phantom user, and wherein a third communication-related data structure is associated with an incoming communication from the first network region to the second network region and the second phantom user.