PAYMENT WORKFLOW EXTENSIBILITY FOR POINT-OF-SALE APPLICATIONS

• US 20110055033A1
• Filed: 08/27/2009
• Published: 03/03/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 08/27/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Microsoft Technology Licensing LLC (Microsoft Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Microsoft Corporation
• Inventors: Balasubramanian, Balaji, Chen, Gang, Belikov, Dmitry V., Lal, Himanshu
• Granted Patent: US 8,655,733 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/18
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/20 Point-of-sale [POS] network systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/40 Authorisation, e.g. identification of payer or payee, verification of customer or shop credentials; Review and approval of payers, e.g. check credit lines or negative lists
• CPC Class Codes: G07G 1/14 Systems including one or more distant stations co-operating with a central processing unit data transmission in general H04L; telemetry systems for selectively calling a substation from a main station H04Q9/00

Abstract

Architecture that employs a software development kit and an add-in model to collect payment data and communicate with payment processors in a point-of-sale (POS) application to meet new requirements in new markets. Data gathered from an add-in and from the POS application can be combined and then communicated to the payment processor. The payment method can be determined and payment processing routed to different payment processors based on data and schema of data collected is also described. An add-in can also programmatically obtain information from the POS application information about a transaction and authorize a payment. A payment collecting/processing API is the interface between the POS application tender logic and payment collecting/processing logic and defines how a payment collecting/processing add-in interacts with the POS application.

Claims

1. An extensible computer-implemented point-of-sale (POS) system, comprising:

an add-in development component of a POS application for implementing interfaces for add-in modules to process a transaction; and

an add-in module that communicates with the POS application via an interface to process payment data as part of the transaction.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the add-in module is a payment collection module that collects the payment data from at least one of POS hardware or via a user interface.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the add-in module is a payment authorization module that processes authorization of the payment data.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the POS application generates POS data and the add-in module generates add-in data, the POS data and the add-in data are combined and transmitted to a payment processor.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the add-in module obtains transaction information from the POS application and authorizes payment based on the transaction information.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the POS application routes payment data to a specific payment processor based on add-in data and schema of the add-in data.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the add-in module registers with the POS application as a hardware add-in.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the POS application executes the add-in module based on format of the payment data.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the add-in module communicates a portion of transaction data of the transaction to a payment processor.

10. An extensible computer-implemented POS system, comprising:

an add-in development component of a POS application that exposes one or more interfaces for add-in modules to process a transaction;

a payment collection add-in module that interfaces to the POS application via an add-in development component interface to collect payment data as part of the transaction; and

a payment processing add-in module that interacts with the POS application via an add-in development component interface to process authorization of the payment data as part of the transaction.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the POS application generates POS data and the payment collection add-in module generates add-in data, the POS data and the add-in data are combined and transmitted to a payment processor.

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the POS application routes payment data to a specific payment processor based on add-in data and schema of the add-in data.

13. The system of claim 10, wherein the POS application executes the payment processing add-in module based on format of the payment data.

14. The system of claim 10, wherein the POS application formats the payment data according to a predefined payment data schema in response to selection of a payment method.

15. A computer-implemented POS method, comprising:

receiving a transaction for processing in a POS application;

executing a payment collection add-in to the POS application as part of the transaction to collect payment data from a POS input component; and

executing a payment processing add-in to the POS application as part of the transaction to authorize payment.

16. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

determining a payment method;

collecting the payment data; and

routing a payment request to a payment processor based on the payment data and schema of the payment data.

17. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

collecting add-in payment data from an add-in;

collecting POS payment data from the POS application;

combining the add-in payment data and the POS payment data; and

communicating the combined payment data to a payment processor.

18. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

obtaining transaction information from the POS application via the payment processing add-in; and

authorizing the payment via the payment processing add-in.

19. The method of claim 15, further comprising:

reading formatted data from a user input medium;

collecting additional transaction information from multiple payment data collecting sources based on the formatted data; and

sending the payment data to a selected payment processor based on the formatted data.

20. The method of claim 15, further comprising loading add-ins on demand.