System and method of tracking vehicle information and bill consolidation

• US 20020087488A1
• Filed: 11/06/2001
• Published: 07/04/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 11/07/2000
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Gelco Corporation (Element Fleet Management Corp.)
• Original Assignee: Gelco Corporation (Element Fleet Management Corp.)
• Inventors: Fordahl, Ron, Greenway, Steve
• Application Number:
  US10/012,912
• Publication Number:
  US 20020087488A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/400
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/02 Marketing; Price estimation or determination; Fundraising
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0283 Price estimation or determination

Abstract

A server company can track expenditures for a client company'"'"'s individual vehicles and fleets of vehicles. The server company can automatically take care of paying the bills relating to outside service repairs from multiple vendors and forward a single itemized bill to the client company. The server company can also notify the client company regarding usage characteristics of various types of vehicles, expenditure trends, and even notify the client company when vehicle needs routine maintenance. The present invention reduces the expenditures a client company associates with maintaining a vehicle fleet, whether the vehicles are leased or owned by the client company

Claims

1. A method for tracking vehicle usage information, the method comprising:

providing a database that is accessible by a client company, the database provided by a server company;

receiving usage information from the client company; and

storing in the database usage information received from the client company, wherein the server company may provide services to the client company based on the database of usage information.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the client company is leasing at least one vehicle from the server company.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the client company owns at least one vehicle for which the usage information is being tracked.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the usage information is maintained by the client company before forwarding the usage information to the server company.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein receiving the usage information from the client company further comprises a user entering the database and entering the usage information.

6. The method of claim 5 further comprising:

storing in the server database billing information consisting of bills from services provided by one or more service providers who have worked on one or more of the vehicles;

the server company paying the bills to the service providers; and

the server company billing the client company for all of the bills the server company has paid on behalf of the client company.

7. The method of claim 1 further comprising the server company compiling a report, the report forwarded to the client company by the server company.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the act of compiling the report further comprises the server company:

totaling information relating to a desired usage characteristic;

forming the totaled information into a report; and

forwarding the report to the client company.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the usage information is transferred to the database at the server system via the Internet.

10. The method of claim 9 wherein the method further comprises electronically soliciting the usage information from a client company;

and electronically receiving the usage information from a client company computer.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein the act of electronically receiving the usage information further comprises an at least one field designed to receive an at least one piece of usage information.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein the usage information is transferred to the database at the server system via a telephone interactive response system.

13. The method of claim 12 wherein the usage information stored in the server system may be accessed by a user at the client company.

15. The method of claim 14 wherein receiving usage information further comprises:

a user logging onto the server system;

the user entering the usage information for a specific vehicle; and

the user logging off of the system.

16. The method of claim 15 wherein receiving the usage information further comprises:

compiling a batch of usage information on a client database maintained by the client company;

downloading the batch of usage information to the database at the server company; and

the server company storing the batch of the usage information.

14. A method for tracking usage information for a fleet of vehicles by a server system maintained by a server company, the method comprising:

providing a database where usage information may be stored and maintained by a server company;

receiving usage information from a client company;

storing said usage information in the database; and

providing services to the client company relating to the stored usage information whereby the client company saves money.

17. A method of consolidating billing information for a vehicle fleet, the method comprising:

collecting separate bills from at least one service provider, the service provider having provided services on the vehicles in the fleet that is utilized by a client company;

paying the separate bills to each service provider;

compiling the total of each bill of from each of the service providers; and

sending one bill to the client company, wherein the client company only pays one bill for all of the services that were provided by the at least one service provider.