Patent ID: 7099826

Claim:
A text-to-speech synthesis apparatus comprising: storage means for storing phoneme data of a plurality of speaker voices; selecting means for selecting one of said plurality of speaker voices in accordance with an operation performed by a user; searching means for searching said storage means for phoneme data of the one speaker voice selected by said selecting means; text-to-speech synthesis processing means for linking said phoneme data of said one speaker voice retrieved by said searching means to convert input data into a synthetic speech; fee-charge control means for controlling a fee-charge operation for the user in accordance with said phoneme data of the one speaker voice selected by said selecting means; and prepaid card loading means for accommodating a prepaid card, wherein said fee-charge control means updates fee-charge information in said prepaid card on a basis of fee-charge data corresponding to said phoneme data of the one speaker voice selected by said selecting means.