Provides methods, apparatus and systems for determining an applicable policy for an incoming message having a service-level addressing element. A method includes the following steps: a) applying a potentially applicable policy (P1) on the incoming message to make the service-level addressing element of the incoming message visible, b) if the service-level addressing element of the incoming message gets visible and is the one to which the currently applied policy (P1) is associated, the currently applied policy (P1) is determined to be the applicable policy, and if not associated c) repeating steps a) and b) with a further potentially applicable policy (P2 . . . Pn).