Systems and methods to detect changes in merchant identification information

• US 10,269,077 B2
• Filed: 06/09/2015
• Issued: 04/23/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 06/09/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Visa International Service Association (Visa, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Visa International Service Association (Visa, Inc.)
• Inventors: Celikyilmaz, Ilker, Chinnappan, Raman, Ghosh, Basudeb, Khan, Muhammad Bassam Adil, Joshi, Mahesh Govind, Chanda, Shashideep, Jogi, Kalpana
• Primary Examiner(s): Wilder, A. Hunter
• Assistant Examiner(s): Mutschler, Joseph M
• Application Number:
  US14/734,342
• Publication Number:
  US 20150356690A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,414 Days
• Field of Search: 705 30
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/12 Accounting

Abstract

A system and method to detect changes in transaction parameters for the identification of a store of the merchant in a payment processing network. The system is configured to monitor input data, such as acquirer'"'"'s merchant master file (AMMF), transaction records, to detect transaction parameters of a processing entity that partially match with the transaction parameters associated with an external, persistent identifier of the merchant and/or the store of the merchant, determine a change or difference introduced in the detect transaction parameters, and update the set of transaction parameters associated with the persistent identifier of the store of the merchant that can be used to identify the set of transaction parameters of the store in a communication external to the communication system of the payment processing network.

Claims

1. A method for automatically updating stored merchant attributes using merchant data received within an electronic payment transaction processing network, comprising:

receiving a master data file from an acquirer system, the master data file comprising;

an identifier uniquely identifying a store of a merchant, and

a plurality of merchant attributes associated with the store of the merchant comprising a first merchant attribute identifying a first merchant associated with the store of the merchant and a second merchant attribute identifying an offer program offered across all stores associated with the first merchant;

storing the master data file in a data warehouse, wherein the data warehouse is coupled with a transaction handler of an electronic payment transaction processing network and a portal; and

updating the master data file by;

in response to initiation of a payment transaction associated with the first merchant and after the master data file has been stored, receiving, by the data warehouse, a transaction message associated with a first payment transaction from the transaction handler, wherein the transaction message comprises first merchant data identifying the first merchant and second merchant data identifying a store associated with the first merchant associated with the first payment transaction;

communicating at least a portion of the master data file and at least a portion of the transaction message from the data warehouse to the portal;

determining, by the portal, a lack of match between;

the identifier and the second merchant data;

determining, by the portal, a match between;

the first merchant attribute and the first merchant data,

determining, by the portal, that the second merchant data corresponds to a new store associated with the first merchant associated with the first payment transaction; and

updating, by the portal, the master data file to include a new store entry associated with the new store, wherein the new store entry comprises the first merchant data, the second merchant data, and the second merchant attribute.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein determining that the second merchant data corresponds to a new store comprises:

determining a probability that the second merchant data corresponds to a new store associated with the first merchant.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the probability is evaluated based at least in part on a degree of mismatching between plurality of merchant attributes associated with the identifier and data included in the transaction message.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

identifying one or more merchant attributes of the plurality of merchant attributes that have not been used in payment transactions of the store of the merchant within a period of time; and

updating the master data file to exclude the one or more merchant attributes of the plurality of merchant attributes.

5. The method of claim 4, further comprising:

determining a probability that the one or more merchant attributes of the plurality of merchant attributes have been eliminated for the store of the merchant; and

prompting a human operator to investigate elimination of the one or more merchant attributes of the plurality of merchant attributes when the probability is below a threshold.

6. The method of claim 1, wherein the transaction handler interconnects a plurality of acquirer systems in control of merchant accounts to receive payments on behalf of merchants and a plurality of issuer systems in control of consumer accounts to make payments on behalf of consumers.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the merchant has a plurality of stores at different locations;

and the identifier uniquely identifies the store of the merchant among the plurality of stores.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein a merchant attribute of the plurality of merchant attributes identifies a plurality of transaction terminals in the store of the merchant.

9. A non-transitory computer storage medium for automatically updating stored merchant attributes using merchant data received within an electronic payment transaction processing network storing instructions configured to instruct a computing apparatus to perform a method, the method comprising:

receiving a master data file from an acquirer system, the master data file comprising;

an identifier uniquely identifying a store of a merchant, and

a plurality of merchant attributes associated with the store of the merchant comprising a first merchant attribute identifying a first merchant associated with the store of the merchant and a second merchant attribute identifying an offer program offered across all stores associated with the first merchant;

storing the master data file in a data warehouse, wherein the data warehouse is coupled with a transaction handler of an electronic payment transaction processing network and a portal; and

updating the master data file by;

in response to initiation of a payment transaction associated with the first merchant and after the master data file has been stored, receiving, by the data warehouse, a transaction message associated with a first payment transaction from the transaction handler, wherein the transaction message comprises first merchant data identifying the first merchant and second merchant data identifying a store associated with the first merchant associated with the first payment transaction;

communicating at least a portion of the master data file and at least a portion of the transaction message from the data warehouse to the portal;

determining, by the portal, a lack of match between;

the identifier and the second merchant data;

determining, by the portal, a match between;

the first merchant attribute and the first merchant data,

determining, by the portal, that the second merchant data corresponds to a new store associated with the first merchant associated with the first payment transaction; and

updating the master data file to include a new store entry associated with the new store, wherein the new store entry comprises the first merchant data, the second merchant data, and the second merchant attribute.

10. A system for automatically updating stored merchant attributes using merchant data received within an electronic payment transaction processing network, comprising:

a transaction handler having at least one microprocessor and a memory storing first instructions configured to instruct the microprocessor to process authorization of a plurality of payment transactions in an electronic payment transaction processing network initiated with an account identification device;

a data warehouse coupled to the transaction handler having at least one data storage device to store a master data file received from an acquirer system, the master data file comprising;

an identifier uniquely identifying a store of a merchant, and

a plurality of merchant attributes associated with the store of the merchant comprising a first merchant attribute identifying a first merchant associated with the store of the merchant and a second merchant attribute identifying an offer program offered across all stores associated with the first merchant,

wherein, the data warehouse is configured to;

in response to initiation of a payment transaction associated with the first merchant and after the master data file has been stored, receive a transaction message associated with a first payment transaction from the transaction handler, wherein the transaction message comprises first merchant data identifying the first merchant and second merchant data identifying a store associated with the first merchant associated with the first payment transaction;

communicate at least a portion of the master data file and at least a portion of the transaction message to a portal; and

the portal coupled with the data warehouse, the portal configured to update the master data file by;

in response to receiving the at least a portion of the master data file and the at least a portion of the transaction message determining, by the portal, a lack of match between;

the identifier and the second merchant data;

determining, by the portal, a match between;

the first merchant attribute and the first merchant data,

determining, by the portal, that the second merchant data corresponds to a new store associated with the first merchant associated with the first payment transaction; and

updating the master data file to include a new store entry associated with the new store, wherein the new store entry comprises the first merchant data, the second merchant data, and the second merchant attribute.

11. The computing apparatus of claim 10, wherein the portal is configured to detect merchant attributes of the plurality of merchant attributes that have not been used in transactions initiated on one or more transaction terminals disposed in the store of the merchant for a predetermined period of time.