Abstract: A call where a packet discard policy (132) should be applied is selectively identified based upon a received property associated with the call. The packet discard policy (132) is applied to the selected call in order to selectively discard packets (134) associated with the call when a triggering event (136) occurs.

Abstract: A communication system provides for an expedited response to an invitation to a Push-to-Talk (PTT) communication session from a terminating side of the communication system when a target mobile station (MS) is not currently available to participate in a PTT communication session by responding to a PTT session invitation prior to an expiration of a second, Paging timer and after a predetermined number of expirations of a first, Tbsreq9 timer or after a predetermined number of unsuccessful requests to page the target MS. In another embodiment of the invention, the communication system may further consider the contents of a downlink buffer of a terminating side Packet Control Function in determining whether and when to respond to an invitation to a PTT communication session, utilizing a third, TpagingBackoff timer in determining when to request a page of a non-responsive target MS.