Automatic cash-collecting monitoring installation

• US 4,703,164 A
• Filed: 03/24/1986
• Issued: 10/27/1987
• Est. Priority Date: 03/22/1985
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Ballag AG (3C Systems AG)
• Original Assignee: Ballag AG (3C Systems AG)
• Inventors: von Ballmoos, Fritz
• Primary Examiner(s): Pitts, Harold I.
• Application Number:
  US06/843,126
• Time in Patent Office: 582 Days
• Field of Search: 235/384, 235/489
• US Class Current: 235/384
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/127 Shopping or accessing services according to a time-limitation
• CPC Class Codes: G07B 15/02 taking into account a variable factor such as distance or time, e.g. for passenger transport, parking systems or car rental systems G07B15/06 takes precedence; taximeters G07B13/00; parking meters per se G07F17/24; car rental systems per se G07B15/00
• CPC Class Codes: G07B 3/02 from stock in wound strip form
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 17/0014 for vending, access and use of specific services not covered anywhere else in G07F17/00 meter-controlled dispensing of liquid, gas or electricity G07F15/00

Abstract

The installation contains, in the entrance monitoring apparatus (10 and FIG. 2), a magazine (36) with a stock (37) of parking tokens which have been individually marked before insertion into the magazine. The entrance monitoring apparatus furthermore contains a reader (39) which operates in conjunction with an electric central unit (13) in order to store the marking on each parking token issued and the time of issue of the token. The cash register (12) of the installation contains a reader which, when a parking token is inserted, calls up the relevant time of issue and calculates the parking fee from the time difference. After the fee has been paid, the time of issue in the memory is erased, and the time of payment is stored. The exit monitoring apparatus (11) contains a further reader which calls up the time of payment when the parking token is inserted, and opens the exit barrier (16) if the time span between the time of insertion and the time of payment is within a predetermined tolerance time.

Claims

1. An automatic cash-collecting monitoring installation for pay parking lots, having at least one entrance monitoring apparatus (10) which issues a parking token and opens an entrance barrier (14) when a vehicle drives up, and having at least one cash register (12) which displays the parking fee after the parking token has been inserted, and causes an exit barrier (16) to open after the fee displayed has been paid, wherein the entrance monitoring apparatus (10) contains a magazine (36) for a large number of parking tokens (37), each of which has a machine-readable individual code (FIG. 3), and a means (41) for issuing individual parking tokens and for reading (39) the code, and an electronic central unit (13) whose memory (19) stores the data associated with the issuing of each parking token and which, when the parking token is inserted into the cash register (12), supplies the data required for calculating the parking fee.

2. An installation as claimed in claim 1, wherein at least one exit monitoring apparatus (11) physically separated from the cash register (12) is provided, and, when a parking token is inserted, the said monitoring apparatus requests that memory location in the memory (19) of the central unit (13) which is assigned to the code of the parking token and opens the exit barrier (16) if the stored entry time, or the time which has elapsed since payment of the parking fee, is within a predetermined tolerance time interval.

3. An installation as claimed in claim 1, wherein, in the entrance monitoring apparatus (10), the means for issuing individual parking tokens contains a transport means and a separating means (41 and 43 respectively), and the large number of parking tokens are inserted in the form of a rolled-up tape (37) into the magazine (36), which tape has the machine-readable codes at predetermined intervals, and which transport means (41), in order to issue a parking token, unrolls the free end of the tape (37) by a length which corresponds to the distance between adjacent codes and feeds it into a reader (39) which reads the code and transmits it to the electronic central unit (13), and which separating means (43) separates off the read part of the tape, which is then issued as a parking token.

4. An installation as claimed in claim 1, wherein the machine-readable code is divided into eight parallel columns (46 to 53) arranged along the longitudinal direction of the parking token, of which four adjacent code fields (46 to 49), in at least one row (55, 56, 57, 58, 59), denote a digit, and the other four adjacent code fields (50 to 53) of the same row (55, 56, 57, 58, 59) denote a decimal place assigned to the digit, and each reader (39) in the entrance monitoring apparatus and in the exit monitoring apparatus (10 and 11 respectively) and in the cash register (12) possesses only eight reading elements arranged in a row transversely with respect to the input or output direction of the parking token.

5. An installation as claimed in claim 1, wherein at least one part of the code is a multidigit number which is used as an address for a memory location in which a first time signal is stored when the parking token is issued, which first time signal is erased and replaced by a second time signal when the parking fee is paid, and which second time signal is erased when the exit barrier (10) is opened.

6. An installation as claimed in claim 1, wherein, when the parking tokens are issued, the memory locations in the memory (19) are occupied consecutively by storage of the parking token code and a first time signal, and, when the parking fee is paid, only the first time signal is erased and replaced by the second time signal, and the second time signal and the parking token code are erased only when the exit barrier (16) is opened.