PAYMENT TOKENS

• US 20080223918A1
• Filed: 03/15/2007
• Published: 09/18/2008
• Est. Priority Date: 03/15/2007
• Status: Abandoned Application

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Williams, Charles J., Bykov, Sergey I.
• Application Number:
  US11/686,630
• Publication Number:
  US 20080223918A1
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 235/379
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/20 Point-of-sale [POS] network systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/342 Cards defining paid or billed services or quantities
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/3674 involving authentication
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/387 Payment using discounts or coupons relating to marketing G06Q30/02
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/025 by means, e.g. cards, providing billing information at the time of purchase, e.g. identification of seller or purchaser, quantity of goods delivered or to be delivered

Abstract

Systems and methods of payment processing via employing a payment token(s) that is supplied to smart portable devices, which are carried by customers. Such a token can be in form of a unique identifier(s) (which is generated by an issuing bank and received by the smart portable devices), and is associated with a payment amount for a merchant. Moreover, the point of sale (POS) terminal can accept the token offline, and hence a requirement for availability of communication between the POS and a payment processor/issuing bank can be mitigated.

Claims

1. A computer implemented system comprising:

a payment token supplied to a smart portable device by a token issuing entity, the smart portable device carried by a customer during interaction with a merchant unit; and

a point of sale (POS) terminal as part of the merchant unit, the POS terminal receives the payment token from the smart mobile device.

2. The computer implemented system of claim 1 further comprising a processing entity that processes the payment token.

3. The computer implemented system of claim 2, the processing entity further processes coupons.

4. The computer implemented system of claim 2 further comprising a workflow engine component that executes a workflow instance that include a list of tasks related to processing tokens.

5. The computer implemented system of claim 2, the work flow engine further comprising a queue to execute tasks according to priority.

6. The computer implemented system of claim 3 further comprising a notification component that notifies an operator for a required input.

7. The computer implemented system of claim 6 further comprising a monitor component that monitors system resources.

8. The computer implemented system of claim 3 further comprising an error detection component that detects existence of error during execution.

9. The computer implemented system of claim 4 further comprising a log file to restart execution of the workflow at a safe state.

10. The computer implemented system of claim 8 further comprising an interface component that facilitates interaction between an operator and the workflow engine.

11. A computer implemented method comprising:

receiving a payment token by a smart portable device; and

forwarding the payment token to a POS terminal by the smart portable device.

12. The computer implemented method of claim 11 further comprising validating the payment token.

13. The computer implemented method of claim 11 further comprising creating a file containing purchase data for the payment token.

14. The computer implemented method of claim 11 further comprising forwarding the payment token to a merchant bank.

15. The computer implemented method of claim 14 further comprising forwarding customer information to the issuing bank by the smart portable device.

17. The computer implemented method of claim 11 further comprising sending a payment request from the POS to the smart portable device.

18. The computer implemented method of claim 15 further comprising transferring funds by the issuing bank.

19. The computer implemented of claim 11 further comprising forwarding a coupon by the smart portable device to the POS.

20. A computer implemented system comprising:

purchasing means for purchasing an item from a POS; and

means for transferring the purchasing means to a processing entity.