Amusement devices: games – Including means for processing electronic data – With communication link
Reexamination Certificate
2000-10-03
2002-05-07
Harrison, Jessica J. (Department: 3713)
Amusement devices: games
Including means for processing electronic data
With communication link
C463S016000, C463S020000, C273S12100R, C700S001000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06383077
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a service communication system for directing a service attendant to an automated, user operated device requiring service attention, and more particularly to a communications system for coordinating the assignments of a pool of service personnel.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In current casino settings the use of a large number of automated gaming devices, including slot machines, is an arrangement of substantial commercial preference. Automated devices allow for more varied selection of games, the comfort of impersonal interchange, along with all the other well-known advantages associated with automation, cybernetics and/or robotics. The automated gaming device and its most basic form, the slot machine, are therefore found in large numbers throughout commercial establishments devoted to gambling.
While the servile, untiring obedience of an automated device is well known, in a casino there still remains a substantial need for personal service. Most frequently the attention required in the course of use of a slot machine or automated gaming device is that associated with the demands of the patron. Typically the playing patron may not understand the mechanics of the use of the machine, may require some credit accommodation, or may simply be out of change. Less frequently, but nonetheless with some regularity, the automated device itself may require service, a function somewhat more technically complex entailing different skills and proficiency.
Both instances, however, evoke the same response from the patron, the response of pushing a summoning button to turn on a light on the machine. Since personal attention needs to be provided promptly to maintain customer satisfaction and loyalty, work duplication is inherent in this current practice. Moreover the number of illuminated summoning lights can become quite large on a busy day, to a point where perception is rendered difficult when displayed against a background of jackpot bells and other flashing lights, a background in which the attending staff encounters some difficulty in perceiving the requesting signal. Confusion is therefore inherent.
In the past various mechanisms have been devised which in one manner or another produce some kind of a remote signal indicating, or even anticipating, a troubling state of an automatic machine. For example: U.S. Pat. No. 5,954,576 to Coulter et al appears to teach a signaling system for a low coin level in a slot machine, allowing for a preemptive replenishment; U.S. Pat. No. 4,614,342 to Takashima appears to teach a multiple player automatic gaming system which is implemented with an indicator useful to indicate operational problems perceived by a player; and U.S. Pat. No. 5,919,091 to Bell et al appears to teach a plurality of casino gaming machines tied together in a computer network which includes servicing requests sent to a central station. Each of the foregoing, while suitable for the purposes intended, fails to attend to the noisy work setting of the attending personnel, and particularly the confusing mix of machine service and patron demand signals that is so prevalent in the current setting.
Those in the art will appreciate that a signal from a gaming casino patron sometimes coincides with one or another failure in the operation of the gaming machine. Simply, the latter precipitates the former. Thus patron attention requests that immediately follow or are contemporaneous with a machine failure are usually reporting the failure, and if both the service attendant and the patron assistant respond duplication is inherent. Accordingly, a logical process is required to detect these coinciding signals in order to direct only the service attendant to provide the response.
Moreover, some machine service requirements are less complex than others and can therefore be sequenced in the service assignment. Thus the service attendant may be assigned to replenish some coin hoppers on his path to the site of a major machine failure, again a logical sequencing process susceptible of programmed implementation. There are therefore numerous instances in a casino setting where coherent, logical communications will both simplify the process while also reducing the stress level of the employees.
Along with these requests summoning personal assistance or machine service are also the occasional signals indicating a jackpot payout that may exceed the coin storage capacity of the machine. These jackpots are usually accompanied by all sorts of light and sound displays which add to the already noisy background of a gambling establishment. Thus machine failure, an imminent need for intervention in the automatic operation thereof (e.g., running out of currency or coin) or any other condition that may be sensed by the diagnostic system of the machine are cumulative with the high stress events of a payout that is often competing with a patron's request for assistance now expressed by a single signal, a light on the machine requesting change.
In the past these concerns have been only sporadically considered, most often in the setting of a particular machine failure or servicing requirement. For example U.S. Pat. No. 5,919,091 to Bell et al appears to teach a communication system between a plurality of slot machines provided with some fault protection and a central control, while U.S. Pat. No. 5,954,583 to Green describes in portions thereof an automatic summoning process for calling a service operator. Once again, each of the foregoing, while suitable for the purposes intended, fails to describe or suggest a summoning system which logically selects the correct responding skill level, while conserving all others to their proper tasks.
Thus, mixed in with the requests summoning personal assistance, are also the occasional signals indicating a jackpot, a machine failure, an imminent need for intervention in the automatic operation thereof (e.g., running out of currency or coin) or any other condition that may be sensed by the diagnostic system of the machine. Clearly, this intense environment is prone to breed patron irritation.
A logical system that optimizes the response patterns and assignments of a large group of attending personnel is therefore extensively sought, and it is one such system that is disclosed herein.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Accordingly, it is the general purpose and object of the present invention to provide a central processing system for logical management of assisting and servicing personnel assignments.
Other objects of the present invention are to provide a wireless communication system for directing the assignments of servicing casino gaming machines and for assisting casino patrons.
Yet further objects of the invention are to provide a communication system for use in a casino for communicating various requests for personal assistance and sequencing machine servicing requests to a central processing facility for retransmission in a logical arrangement to individual ones of servicing and assisting personnel.
Briefly, these and other objects are accomplished within the present invention by providing a communication link between the various slot machines, automatic gaming machines and other automated devices in the casino that interface with a patron, and a central processing station. The communication link may be hard wired, by radio frequency (RF), infrared or even optical carrier and may convey separate codes for at least the following events at a gaming machine:
1. The patron has depressed the change button, causing a light to go on on top of the machine;
2. The player has caused the statistical combination of a jackpot and there is a large payment due;
3. The gaming machine is out of coins;
4. The machine is simply jammed; and
5. The machine is in some other failure state.
Of course, the first condition will often occur in parallel with items 2 through 5, as a patron will typically reach for the sole communication mechanism once any difficulty arises. Accordingly, within the central processing stat
Bossung Wayne A.
Kweitko Ira A.
Cherubin Yveste G.
Harrison Jessica J.
Quirk & Tratos
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