A communications network configuration for delivery of multimedia services comprises a packet network to which a plurality of terminal devices are connected, a service provider network for providing multimedia services to the terminal devices, a virtual circuit switched network intermediate the packet and service provider networks, and a gateway distributed over the circuit switched network. The distributed gateway comprises a client application unit interfacing the circuit switched network to said packet network and a virtual channel interface unit interfacing the circuit switched network to the service provider network. The client application unit binds logical channels for a multimedia call to association tags for respective virtual channels of the circuit switched network and forwards said association tags to the virtual interfacing unit. The interfacing unit assigns to the multimedia call one or more virtual channels associated with the association tags and informs the client application unit of channel numbers for the assigned channels to thereby complete set up of the multimedia call.