Abstract: Improved billing accuracy in session-based communications is provided by separating session (or connection) billing from session processing. If two sessions (440, 442) on the same serving node are bridged, so the true stop time of the prior session (440) is not known, the stop time of the prior session is defined as a function of the last activity during (TALS1) that session. To accomplish this, the serving node detects and stores the time of last activity and the time of initiation for each connection and determines the billing time accordingly, regardless of the state of the inactivity timer (430) or whether sessions were bridged by the serving node.