Method and apparatus for providing customization of public safety answering point information delivery

1. A method for providing emergency call services, which comprises:

receiving at an automated third-party service center a communication from a vehicle over a data channel;

automatically sending signaling to the vehicle from the third-party service center;

receiving at the third-party service center over the data channel in response to the signaling, synthetic audio in the form of recorded audio or text-to-speech message from the vehicle, the synthetic audio being generated by a vehicle e-call system and representing location information comprising at least latitude and longitude coordinates of the vehicle;

using an automated speech recognition system located at the third-party service center, transcribing from the synthetic audio and into text data at least the latitude and longitude coordinates to determine if the coordinates are valid; and

if the coordinates are valid, automatically forwarding information from the vehicle communication and the location information to a public safety answering point (PSAP) determined by the third-party service center.

2. The method according to claim 1 , wherein the speech recognition system accepts packet audio data.

3. The method according to claim 1 , which further comprises determining the PSAP with a database containing characteristic information on a plurality of PSAPs.

4. The method according to claim 3 , which further comprises utilizing the database to select the PSAP using voice and/or location information.

5. The method according to claim 4 , wherein the database is resident in an external device.

6. The method according to claim 5 , wherein the external device comprises an emergency services call router connected to the third-party service center over an Internet connection.

7. The method according to claim 1 , which further comprises determining alternate position information and using the alternate position information to check the location information.

8. The method according to claim 7 , wherein the alternate position information is provided by a mobile device locator that determines the alternate position information using cellular network-based methods.

9. The method according to claim 1 , which further comprises using a live agent to determine the location information when useable location information cannot be determined automatically.

10. A system for providing emergency call services, which comprises:

a vehicle e-call system;

a plurality of public safety answering points (PSAPs); and

an automated third-party service center that:

receives a communication from the vehicle e-call system over a data channel;

automatically sends signaling to the vehicle e-call system in response to the communication received from the vehicle e-call system;

in response to the signaling, receives synthetic audio from the vehicle e-call system over the data channel, the synthetic audio being in the form of recorded audio or a text-to-speech message and representing location information comprising at least latitude and longitude coordinates of the vehicle;

using an automated speech recognition system located at the third-party service center, transcribing from the synthetic audio and into text data at least the latitude and longitude coordinates to determine if the coordinates are valid;

if the coordinates are valid, determines a selected one of the plurality of PSAPs; and

automatically forwards information from the vehicle communication and the location information to the selected PSAP.

11. The system according to claim 10 , wherein the speech recognition system accepts packet audio data.

12. The system according to claim 10 , wherein the plurality of public safety answering points (PSAPs) each have characteristic information and further comprising a database containing the characteristic information on the plurality of PSAPs used by the third-party service center to determine the selected PSAP.

13. The system according to claim 12 , wherein the third-party service center accesses the database to select the PSAP using voice and/or location information.

14. The system according to claim 13 , wherein the database is resident in an external device.

15. The system according to claim 14 , wherein the external device comprises an emergency services call router connected to the third-party service center over an Internet connection.

16. The system according to claim 10 , wherein the third-party service center determines alternate position information and uses the alternate position information to check the location information.

17. The system according to claim 16 , further comprising a mobile device locator that provides the alternate position information and determines the alternate position information using cellular network-based methods.

18. The system according to claim 10 , wherein the third-party service center screens rogue or runaway devices from reaching the PSAP.