Data processing: financial – business practice – management – or co – For cost/price – Postage meter system
Reexamination Certificate
1998-02-24
2002-09-24
Sough, Hyung-Sub (Department: 2761)
Data processing: financial, business practice, management, or co
For cost/price
Postage meter system
Reexamination Certificate
active
06456987
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to a mail processing system with a printing machine base controlled via a personal computer of the type having a number of personal computer components in communication with each other via a personal computer system bus, and the printing machine base including a printing station for purely electronic printing in which a printhead is connected to printhead control electronics.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A system of the above type is suitable for processing filled letters of different formats given medium through high shipping quantities. The basic structure composed of the two components, personal computer and machine base station, enables economical adaptation to different customer demands. The system can be operated as a franking system, a shipping system or a postal matter valuation system for a number of carriers.
Letter production ensues at the personal computer in modern offices. The letters that are printed out are manually put in envelopes in the office or are automatically placed in envelopes with an envelope stuffing system. Beginning with a medium through higher number of letters to be sent, or other postal matter, postage meter machines are used in a standard way for franking the postal matter. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 4,746,234 is directed to a thermal transfer postage meter machine that is surrounded by a secured housing.
It is known to construct a franking system composed of individual components. U.S. Pat. No. 5,510,992 (Post N Mail) discloses a system that is composed of two components, namely a personal computer and an office printer. The postage is stored in hardware modules that are connected to the personal computer PC via a standard interface. A specific program that is stored on the PC-contained storage media (for example, hard disk) implements the postage calculation, reduces the stored amount of postage and generates the data for the franking imprint that are transmitted to the office printer. Except for the specific postage memory modules, this PC system manages without additional hardware components, however, it is affected by two deficiencies:
a) The use of an ordinary office printer only enables unfilled envelopes to be printed. Filled envelopes, with their varying letter thicknesses, cannot be drawn into an office printer. This disadvantage limits the application of such a system to the smallest quantities of letter pages. This solution cannot be utilized in a mail expediting office that is to prepare mail arriving centrally from various departments of a concern in a form ready for shipping.
b) The postage accounting program that is processed by the processor of the personal computer can be tampered with. The program can be modified such that it works like the original except for the reduction of the postage amount that is stored in the specific postage memory module. The customer would thus have no necessity of reloading the postage memory module in return for payment at the postal authority, whereas he can continue to provide his expedited mail with franking imprints in an unlimited fashion. Access to the postage accounting program is easily possible, for example by removing the hard disk. This could not even be documented since the program—in contrast to a conventional, electronic postage meter machine—is not in a tampered housing. The manipulated program can be stored in addition to the original program and would be normally run, except in the case of an inspection, when reversion to the original program is made. If the tampered program is also protected by a pass word, the tampering can hardly be detected at all.
A PC-supported franking device is disclosed in European Patent 459 159 that is protected better against manipulation. This solution is based on a specific franking module that is insertable into a slot of a personal computer and is connected to the internal information and power supply network of the personal computer. This franking module contains an independent processor system with postage memories as well as an integrated printing device for the franking of envelopes. By integrating the printing device, one succeeds in overcoming the general deficiency of a lack of security of the aforementioned PC franking system. The user prompting advantageously utilizes the resources of a personal computer, particularly the monitor, keyboard and operating system. Although this solution allows the processing of filled letters to a limited extent, it only allows small letter formats. The slot of the personal computer must also have a correspondingly suitable size (5¼″) in order to accept the franking module, but this is assured with decreasing frequency due to the increasing miniaturization of modern personal computers. The manual supply of the envelope or of a postage tape is only suitable for mail processing on a small scope, i.e. for a low volume of mail. An automatic processing of stacked mail is already precluded due to the lack of a possibility of combination with an automatic letter separation unit. This solution is thus also only suitable for low letter volume.
According to U.S. Pat. No. Re. 31,875, a protected electronic meter is located between a computer and a protected printer, with the protected printer being connected to the meter via protective lines and protected connector parts. The user is not allowed to change the meter nor to open the protected line in order to expand the system. Such a system is not service-friendly.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,200,903 discloses a similar solution. A personal computer or a work station is connected via a multi-path cable to a peripheral postage meter machine that contains an accounting and control module (meter) and a printer both for printing the postage imprint as well as for printing the recipient address. A modem is connected to the personal computer. The personal computer functions as communication equipment and assumes the calculation of the respective postage fees for the individual shipped items on the basis of stored postage fee tables. The peripheral accounting module is relieved of this calculation-intensive and memory-intensive function. No additional scale has to be connected to the postage meter machine when the weight of the letter can be calculated by the personal computer on the basis of the letter contents. The accounting module of the postage meter machine includes a processor system with postage memories and undertakes the accounting. The directly connected control module controls the printing of address and postage imprint. Due to the protective housing, protected lines and protected connector parts between accounting module and printer can be foregone in this solution. Adequately good access to an individual components for a service, however, is still not established.
The low working speed of the overall system is disadvantageous in both of these aforementioned solutions. This speed is defined by the data transmission rate on the connection between the input/output port of the personal computer and that of the accounting module. For lack of a suitable base station for conveying postal matter, a fast, automatic processing of mixed mail, with changing postage fees from letter-to-letter, is practically impossible.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,309,393 discloses a remotely loaded postage meter machine that is connected to a personal computer that contains a modem and sets up a communication connection with a telephone network. A scale can be additionally connected to the postage meter machine or can be integrated in the postage meter machine housing. This is again a closed, and thus protected, system that, however, continues to exhibit the aforementioned disadvantages. Alternatively, an open system is proposed according to another embodiment of U.S. Pat. No. 5,309,393. An interface board is inserted into a slot of the personal computer, this interface board contains an interface to a scale cell and to a display unit as well as a non-volatile electronically erasable and programmable memory EEP
Dixon Thomas A.
Francotyp-Postalia AG & Co.
Schiff & Hardin & Waite
Sough Hyung-Sub
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