A method for optimizing service-based billing in a network environment is provided that includes interfacing, by a home policy server residing in a home network of an end user, with a visited policy server in a visited network and with an application server, the application server contacting the home policy server when the end user elects to invoke an application in the home network, the application server contacting the home policy server and passing a set of application descriptors to the policy server, the application descriptors being tokens that describe one or more characteristics of the application for charging.