Data processing: financial – business practice – management – or co – For cost/price – Postage meter system
Reexamination Certificate
2000-04-17
2001-12-04
Sough, Hyung-Sub (Department: 2161)
Data processing: financial, business practice, management, or co
For cost/price
Postage meter system
C705S408000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06327580
ABSTRACT:
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates generally to postage printing systems. More particularly, this invention is directed to a postage printing system including subsidies for printing of third party messages.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Postage printing systems are well known in the art. A typical postage meter (one example of a postage printing system) applies evidence of postage, commonly referred to as a postal indicia, to an envelope or other mailpiece and accounts for the value of the postage dispensed. As is well known, postage meters include an ascending register, that stores a running total of all postage dispensed by the meter, and a descending register, that holds the remaining amount of postage credited to the meter and that is reduced by the amount of postage dispensed during a transaction. The postage meter generally also includes a control sum register which provides a check upon the descending and ascending registers. The control sum register has a running account of the total funds having been added into the meter. The control sum register must always correspond with the summed readings of the ascending and descending registers. Thus, the control sum register is the total amount of postage ever put into the machine and it is alterable only when adding funds to the meter. In this manner, by inspecting the various registers and securing them from tampering, the dispensing of postal funds may be accurately recorded, tracked and accounted for.
More recently, a postage printing system has been developed where the accounting structure described above is no longer resident with the user of the postage printing device. Sometimes referred to as a “virtual postage meter”, these types of postage printing systems dispense postage electronically over suitable communication channels (LAN, WAN, telephone lines, Internet, etc.). The user maintains an account with a remotely located data center (maintained by an authorized postage meter manufacturer) and receives postage securely using appropriate electronic data interchange techniques. At a later time, the user is invoiced for the amount of postage dispensed and any other fees associated with maintaining the account with the data center. Oftentimes, a secret code or token is derived from information particular to the mailpiece (the indicated postage amount, date, recipient address information, etc.) and is incorporated or embedded into the postal indicia for later use by a postal authority in verifying the integrity of the postal indicia. Examples of such systems are described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,725,718 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,454,038.
It is also known to print selected messages (sometimes referred to as ad slogans although such messages are not necessarily restricted to advertisements) along with the postal indicia. Generally, the message bears no relation to the postal indicia. In traditional postage meters employing either rotary drum or flat bed printing technology, the message is printed along with the postal indicia by including an additional printing die representative of the message. These dies are typically costly to manufacture and distribute and cumbersome for the postage meter user to remove/install. Also, due to physical space requirements, there are practical limits as to the number of message dies that are readily available for printing. Examples of die based systems for printing messages are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,168,804 and 5,024,153. More recently, the postage meter industry has begun to incorporate digital (dot matrix) printing technology which obviates the need for dies as the digital printer may be supplied with suitable drive signals to effect printing of the message. Thus, a graphical representation of the message may be stored in memory and used by a digital printer to print the message. Here also, due to the cost and availability of memory space, there are practical limits as to the number of graphic message files that may be stored and made readily available for printing. Examples of digital printing technology based systems for printing messages are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,831,554 and 5,509,109.
Additionally, U.S. Pat. No. 4,831,554 teaches a system that allows the postage meter manufacturer to broker the use of advertising space by third parties on the envelopes. In concept, a third party advertiser may wish to take advantage of the space on the outgoing envelopes from a particular postage meter user to advertise its own products and/or services or communicate some other type of message. In this system, a message the content of which originates from a third party is stored electronically within the postage meter. The postage meter keeps a count of the number of times that the message is printed in conjunction with the postal indicia. This count is then used by the data center to provide a subsidy to the postage meter user during a subsequent billing cycle and is correspondingly also used by the data center to invoice the third party advertiser.
Although this brokering system represents a new business opportunity for postage meter manufacturers, it suffers from certain drawbacks and disadvantages. First, the third party advertiser cannot exercise any control over when the message is dispensed. Thus, if the message is time sensitive, then the relevance of the message may be lost after a certain date and the third party advertiser would be compelled to pay for advertising that was not effective. For example, advertisements directed to promotions that have expiration dates (rebate programs, concert tickets, limited time offers, political election/other voting inducements, etc.) are useless once the relevant time period has passed. Second, the third party advertiser cannot exercise any control over the number of messages dispensed. Thus, if the third party advertiser allocated a fixed advertising budget and accordingly only wanted to pay for a limited number of envelopes containing the message, then the third party advertiser may be compelled to pay for advertising that was not wanted if the postage meter user generates increased mail volume over that which was anticipated. Third, the third party advertiser cannot exercise any control over who receives the message. Thus, the third party advertiser has no assurance that a target audience would be reached. As one example, advertisements (e.g. sports related or hair loss, as examples) intended primarily for males may not be relevant if the recipient of the envelope from the postage meter user was a female. Fourth, the third party advertiser cannot exercise any control over the geographic reach of the message. Here again, the third party advertiser has no assurance that the target audience would be reached. For example, advertisements (e.g. local car dealership or cleaning service, as examples) intended for a certain limited geographic region would not be relevant if the recipient of the envelope from the postage meter user was located many miles away from the certain limited geographic region. As a related example, advertisements intended for the certain limited geographic region on envelopes originating from outside of the certain limited geographic region would not benefit from the increased good will of being associated with a sender located in the certain limited geographic region.
Although this brokering system represents a new opportunity for users to subsidize the costs associated with preparing and sending envelopes, it suffers from certain drawbacks and disadvantages. First, the user may not want the recipient gaining the impression that the user endorses the third party message. Thus, the user may not want to be associated with certain types of third party messages. For instance, political messages, messages from competitor's and the like may not be appropriate for the user's envelope. Second, dilution of any user message is likely to occur if third party messages appear. Thus, the effectiveness of the user message is reduced. Third, some recipients may experience a loss of intimacy with the user due to the appearance
Kaye Steven M.
Pierce Jeffrey D.
Chaclas Angelo N.
Elisca Pierre Eddy
Melton Michael E.
Pitney Bowes Inc.
Sough Hyung-Sub
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