USER TERMINAL-INITIATED HARD HANDOFF FROM A WIRELESS LOCAL AREA NETWORK TO A CELLULAR NETWORK

A system and method are provided for supporting a multi-mode portable user terminal (UT) hard handoff procedure for a call from a wireless local area network (WLAN) to a cellular telephone network. The method includes: establishing a link between a UT and a serving WLAN; establishing a call via the established WLAN link; monitoring the WLAN link signal strength; simultaneously monitoring a serving cellular network; initiating a hard handoff to the cellular network, responsive to the monitored WLAN link signal strength falling below a minimum threshold; and, continuing the call via the cellular network. More specifically, the method initiates a call handoff to a Cellular Gateway (CGW) telephone number, responsive to the monitored WLAN link signal strength falling below the minimum threshold. Then, continuing the call via the cellular network includes continuing the call to the first telephone number via the CGW handoff telephone number.