Assisted service terminal

• US 10,217,328 B2
• Filed: 11/22/2010
• Issued: 02/26/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 07/26/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: NCR Atleos Corp.
• Original Assignee: NCR Corporation (NCR Voyix Corporation)
• Inventors: McDade, Fiona, Hall, John, Choutapelly, Kisan
• Primary Examiner(s): Ouellette, Jonathan P
• Application Number:
  US12/951,503
• Publication Number:
  US 20120023028A1
• Time in Patent Office: 3,018 Days
• Field of Search: 705 11-912
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/20 Administration of product repair or maintenance
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 19/206 Software aspects at ATMs
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 19/209 Monitoring, auditing or diagnose of functioning of ATMs
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 9/023 Arrangements for display, data presentation or advertising

Abstract

An assisted service terminal is described. The terminal comprises a currency dispenser; and an operator computer coupled to the currency dispenser. The operator computer includes: (i) an agent arranged to communicate status information to a remote management system, and (ii) a dashboard application. The dashboard application is arranged to (a) receive status messages from the currency dispenser indicative of a fault in the currency dispenser, (b) present the received status messages to an operator, and (c) notify the agent to issue a request to create an incident on the remote management system in response to the operator indicating that the fault cannot be resolved without a visit from a service engineer.

Claims

1. An assisted service terminal operable by a local operator trained to correct faults associated with the assisted service terminal, the assisted service terminal comprising:

a currency dispenser including a currency recycler integrated into the currency dispenser; and

an operator computer coupled to the currency dispenser, the operator computer including;

(i) an agent configured to execute on the operator computer and further configured during execution to communicate status information to a remote management system, and wherein the agent is a software component of the operator computer;

(ii) a dashboard application configured to execute on the operator computer and further configured to

(a) receive status messages from the currency dispenser indicative of a fault therein,

(b) present the received status messages to the local operator,

(c) receive an indication from the local operator in response to presenting the status messages, and

(d) notify the agent to issue a request to create an incident on the remote management system in response to the indication received from the local operator indicating that the fault cannot be resolved without a visit from a service engineer, wherein the agent is notified by the operator computer without the local operator making a request for notification to be sent and based on the currency dispenser being identified as previously being faulty and based on notification of a previous fault communicated from the currency recycler;

(iii) a control application arranged to control the operation of the currency dispenser and to provide a user interface to the operator; and

(iv) a communication channel proxy connected to a firmware controller of the currency dispenser and the channel proxy connected to the operator computer having the control application, the communication channel proxy arranged to send the status messages relating to the currency dispenser to the control application for presentation in the user interface and to send the status messages to the agent for delivery to the remote management system, and the communication channel proxy configured to intercept messages transmitted between the control application and the currency recycler and copy those intercepted messages to the dashboard application, wherein the communication channel proxy is further configured to process a message filter to determine where particular messages are to be sent when the messages are intercepted.

2. An assisted service terminal according to claim 1, wherein the dashboard application is arranged to receive status messages directly from the currency dispenser.

3. An assisted service terminal according to claim 1, wherein the agent comprises a simple network management protocol status agent.

4. An assisted service terminal according to claim 1, wherein the agent and the dashboard application are provided as components of a status monitoring application.

5. An assisted service terminal according to claim 1, wherein the dashboard application is arranged to notify the agent to issue a request to create an incident on a remote management system indirectly by creating an event in a repository monitored by the agent.

6. A method of operating an assisted service terminal operable by a local operator trained to correct faults associated with the assisted service terminal, the method implemented as executable instructions residing in a non-transitory computer-readable medium and executed by a hardware processor, the method comprising:

receiving, by the processor, a status message relating to a currency dispenser, where the status message is indicative of a fault in the currency dispenser, wherein receiving further includes receiving the status message from a communication channel proxy connected to a firmware controller of the currency dispenser;

providing, by the processor, details of the fault to the local operator of the assisted service terminal to allow the local operator to attempt to correct the fault;

providing, by the communication channel proxy, the status message to a remote management system;

receiving, by the processor, an indication from the local operator in response to providing the details of the fault;

sending, by the processor, an updated status message from the assisted service terminal in the event that the local operator has corrected the fault; and

sending, by the processor, a request to the remote management system for a service engineer to correct the fault in response to the indication received from the local operator indicating a selection by the local operator that the local operator cannot correct the fault without the local operator having to make the request and based on identifying the currency dispenser as having been previously faulty and based on notification of a previous fault communicated from a currency recycler that is included within or integrated into the currency dispenser, wherein sending further includes intercepting, by the communication channel proxy messages transmitted between a control application and the currency recycler and copying those intercepted messages to a dashboard application and filtering, by the communication channel proxy messages based on a message filter determining where to send particular messages from the intercepted messages.

7. A method according to claim 6, wherein the method comprises the further step of confirming to the operator that a request for a service engineer has been dispatched.

8. A method according to claim 7, wherein the step of confirming to the operator that a request for a service engineer has been dispatched includes displaying an incident code to the operator and/or providing an estimated time when the service engineer will arrive.

9. A managed terminal system comprising:

a central management system for managing a plurality of terminals; and

an assisted service terminal coupled to the central management system by a network, the assisted service terminal operable by a local operator trained to correct faults associated with the assisted service terminal;

wherein the assisted service terminal comprises a currency dispenser that includes a currency recycler, and an operator computer coupled to the currency dispenser, the operator computer including;

(i) an agent configured to execute on the operator computer and configured to communicate status information to the central management system, the agent a software component of the operator computer, (ii) a dashboard application configured to execute on the operator computer and configured to (a) receive status messages from the agent indicative of a fault in the currency dispenser, (b) present the received status messages to the local operator, (c) receive an indication from the local operator in response to presenting the status messages, and (d) notify the agent to issue a request to create an incident on the central management system in response to the indication received from the local operator indicating that the fault cannot be resolved without a visit from a service engineer, wherein the operator computer adapted to notify the agent without the local operator having to make a request for notification and based on currency dispenser being identified as having been previously faulty and based on notification of a previous fault communicated from the currency recycler included with and integrated into the currency dispenser; and

(iii) a communication channel proxy connected to a firmware controller of the currency dispenser, the communication channel proxy configured to;

(a) send the status messages to the dashboard application, (b) send the status message to the central management system, (c) intercept messages transmitted between a control application and the currency recycler, (d) copy those intercepted messages to the dashboard application, and (e) process a message filter to determine where to send particular messages from the messages intercepted.

10. A managed terminal system according to claim 9, wherein the managed terminal system further comprises a self-service terminal.

11. A managed terminal system according to claim 10, wherein the self-service terminal comprises an automated teller machine.

12. A managed terminal system according to claim 9, wherein the central management system creates an incident in response to any status information indicating a fault in the currency dispenser.

13. A managed terminal system according to claim 9, wherein the central management system closes an incident in response to any status information indicating that a previously reported fault in the currency dispenser has now been corrected.