Patent ID: 8477917

Claim:
A method for providing wireline telephone services, said method comprising: providing wireline telephone service to a residence for a customer to place telephone calls; in response to receiving an activate code at a service provider system, activating, using a processor of the service provider system, the wireline telephone service; in response to receiving a deactivate code at the service provider system, deactivating the wireline telephone service; and determining whether the wireline telephone service was in an activated state during a billing cycle and in response to a determination that the wireline telephone service was in the activated state during the billing cycle, billing the customer for the wireline telephone service at a first rate; billing the customer for the wireline telephone service at a second rate lower than the first rate in response to a determination that the wireline telephone service was not in the activated state during the billing cycle; and billing the customer on a per-call basis for calls made using the wireline telephone service while the wireline telephone service is in a deactivated state; and further comprising generating an inactive wireline telephone service dial tone when the wireline telephone service of a transient customer is inactive and a telephone of the transient customer is off-hook.