Data processing: financial – business practice – management – or co – Automated electrical financial or business practice or... – Finance
Reexamination Certificate
2000-09-29
2004-04-13
Jeanty, Romain (Department: 3623)
Data processing: financial, business practice, management, or co
Automated electrical financial or business practice or...
Finance
C705S034000, C705S039000, C705S050000, C705S044000, C705S075000, C705S076000, C705S078000, C705S080000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06721716
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates generally to a client/server software solution for collecting, summarizing and storing individualized content information and allowing a user of the software to provide a directed response thereto, and, more particularly, for example, to a computerized electronic statement, bill presentment and payment system and a method of presenting bills electronically to a customer and initiating payments and other instructions by computer.
While several electronic bill presentment and payment systems have recently been developed, systems which collect and present bill information from individual billers have typically required that the user contact each biller that provides electronic bill presentment and payment services separately to set-up and use such services. These services have the disadvantage of requiring the user to contact each biller each time bill information is desired and of requiring the user to enter payment account information each time the service is configured. Moreover, the user has the additional difficulty in managing the information and deriving summary information from several related bills (for example, all the bills due for a given month) because the information is not collected in a single document. Since each biller may use different software and bill formats for presenting electronic bills, the user will have the problem of obtaining and managing several different software programs. There is also the additional difficulty of centrally managing personal assets and cash flow with respect to the user's personal accounts bank and credit and tracking outstanding or paid bills. From the biller's perspective, the biller also has problems in managing cash flow and accounts receivable with respect to customer payments.
More recently, electronic bill presentment and payment services have been provided by third party consolidators. Various billers format electronic bills according to a standard prescribed by the consolidator and send the information to the consolidator. A user connects to the consolidator to review the current bills and provide instructions for payment. The consolidator will typically process the payment instructions from the user on behalf of all of the billers.
In order for such systems to be useful, a wide variety of billers must agree to provide bills in the prescribed format to a single consolidator. In that way, a user would need to only connect with a single consolidator in order to review all or many of his bills and/or provide payment instructions. However, such systems have the problem that the user may not wish the third party consolidator to have access to all of the information contained in that user's electronic bills. Additionally, in all likelihood, there will inevitably be several consolidators competing to sign up billers and users, each one having a sub-set of a user's billers. In such a situation, it would not be efficient for the user to connect to the several consolidators needed to retrieve and pay all of his bills and manage his information in one program.
In any electronic bill presentment and payment system, it is generally difficult and expensive to collect the bill detail information and format it in a manner consistent with the consolidators. Furthermore, individual billers may have information to send to customers that does not fit in with a consolidator's presentment format.
What is desired is an electronic statement, bill presentment and payment system and method that overcomes the limitations of the prior art. A system and method is desired which would permit electronic statement, bill presentment and payment services to be provided to a user by a wide variety of billers in which the user can centrally manage all of his electronic statements, bills, and in which no third party consolidator is used, and in which such services are provided in a secure manner assuring the user's privacy.
In another aspect, the invention relates to an electronic payment system and method, and more particularly to such a system and method for processing payments from a checking account or other funding account using a payment certification string comprising funding account information of a customer, and validation information of a certifying authority.
Up to the present, processing of electronic payments from a customer to a biller has generally required the biller to participate in a global electronic transaction network and confirm that funding account information provided by the customer is correct. In the case of customer checking accounts, automated clearinghouse (ACH) transactions have been used to accommodate the electronic clearing of checks. In general, the processors of the ACH system have required the biller to maintain a signature card on file for a customer in order to accept electronic checks from that customer. Therefore, payment by electronic checks has only been used regularly where there is an established, continual relationship between a biller or other vendor and the customer or other purchaser.
As a result, electronic checks have not generally been used for Internet commerce where a purchase may be made on a onetime basis from a merchant. In fact, generally, the merchant will require payment at the time of purchase and the parties to the transaction may have had no previous contact.
What is desired is a system and method for processing electronic payment instructions of a customer to a biller, preferably using electronic checks, that overcomes the limitations of the prior art. A system and method is desired which would permit immediate processing of an ACH payment from a customer to an e-commerce vendor (biller) even when there is no established relationship between the customer and the biller, and no signature card of the customer on file with the biller.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Generally speaking, in accordance with the present invention, an electronic individualized content presentment and directed response system is provided. The system advantageously provides for a method of presenting electronic content individualized for a specific user from several content providers and allows that user to initiate directed instructions to each content provider responsive to the content. The system is constructed and arranged to assure a secure and private connection, and transfer of information directly between a content provider and an individual recipient.
In a preferred embodiment directed to an electronic statement, bill presentment and payment system, computer software allows a customer to view statements and bills from multiple billers and make payments to the billers using a personal computer, Web TV, personal digital assistant or the like connected to a digital electronic or global communications network. The software eliminates the need for both the customer and the biller to sign up with a consolidator, and allows the biller and the customer to interact directly.
The system of the invention comprises an end user electronic desktop application (the client) which communicates over, for example, the Internet with one or more server applications (each a server) associated with each content provider. While the detailed discussion of a preferred embodiment includes a description of the system and method being advantageously used for statement and bill presentment and payment services, other interactive and individualized communications between a user and a content provider are contemplated within the scope of the invention and will be separately described as appropriate.
A preferred embodiment of the method and system for electronic statement, bill presentment and payment may provide the following services among others:
Biller Account and Funding Account Maintenance
This includes enrollment with a biller for statement and bill presentment and payment as well as management of changes to the biller account information and/or funding account information.
Statement Notification
Notification may be provided to the customer that new bills or stateme
Jeanty Romain
Kramer Levin Naftalis & Frankel LLP
Mobius Management Systems, Inc.
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