Consumer-based system and method for managing and paying electronic billing statements

• US 20050065883A1
• Filed: 11/15/2004
• Published: 03/24/2005
• Est. Priority Date: 09/09/1997
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Saliba, Bassam, Dent, Warren T., Kaethler, Judy, Remington, Darren B.
• Granted Patent: US 7,610,245 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/40
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/04 Payment circuits
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/10 specially adapted for electronic funds transfer [EFT] systems; specially adapted for home banking systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/102 Bill distribution or payments
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/108 Remote banking, e.g. home banking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/14 specially adapted for billing systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/04 Billing or invoicing
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/128 Check-book balancing, updating or printing arrangements

Abstract

A consumer-based bill management and payment system is configured to receive, analyze, manage and pay electronic billing statements received from the biller over the Internet. The system includes a notification manager that detects when the electronic bill arrives and notifies the consumer. The bill is stored in memory with other unpaid electronic bills. According to another aspect of the invention, the system has a cashflow analyzer that enables the consumer to coordinate the unpaid electronic bills according to different payment schedules for a bill payment cycle (e.g., a month). The goal of the manipulation is to permit the consumer to analyze how the different payment schedules affect the consumer'"'"'s cashflow with an aim toward minimizing overdraft during the bill payment cycle. The cashflow analyzer can automatically compute an optimized payment schedule that minimizes overdraft of the consumer'"'"'s account, while maximizing the balance to generate the most interest. When the consumer desires to pay a particular bill, the bill is presented to the consumer through a graphical user interface (UI). The bill management and payment system supports a payment analyzer to enable the consumer to determine how much of the electronic bill to pay. The payment analyzer provides a venue to challenge certain items on the bill.

Claims

1. A cashflow analyzer embodied as a computer program on a computer-readable medium, comprising:

code means for collecting unpaid electronic bills received electronically from a biller; and

code means for enabling a consumer to coordinate the unpaid bills according to different possible payment schedules for a bill payment cycle so that the consumer can analyze how the different payment schedules affect the consumer'"'"'s cashflow during the bill payment cycle.

2. A cashflow analyzer as recited in claim 1, further comprising code means for automatically generating an optimized payment schedule for a particular bill payment cycle that maximizes interest or minimizes overdraft of the consumer'"'"'s account.