Adaptable personnel supervisory system with automatic fee collection
First Claim
1. An adaptable personnel supervisory system (PSS) comprising:
- a fee-based communication network that automatically charges a toll fee to a user thereof once telecommunicative contact has been established through the fee-based communication network with a host unit for a specified preamble time period;
a central processing unit (CPU) coupled to said fee-based communication network;
a memory coupled to said CPU having enrollment data stored therein that identifies enrollees who are under an obligation to contact said PSS in accordance with a prescribed contact schedule; and
control means for controlling the operation of said CPU to provide a specified supervisory function, said control means including;
answering means for automatically answering an incoming call over said fee-based telephone network,call verification means for verifying before the expiration of said preamble time period whether the incoming call is a valid call, and if not for terminating the incoming call before the toll fee is charged, a valid call comprising an incoming call from one of said enrollees in accordance with the prescribed contact schedule, whereby the toll fee is not charged unless the incoming call is valid,prompting means responsive to said verifying means for prompting a given enrollee who has made a valid call to said PSS to provide selected information,recording means for recording any selected information provided by the given enrollee in response to the prompting means, andreport means for selectively generating host reports that selectively identify which enrollees have not made contact with the host unit, which enrollees have made contact with the host unit, and the selected information provided by the enrollees who have made contact with the host unit;
whereby each enrollee is automatically charged the toll fee whenever he or she contacts the PSS by means of a valid call placed through said fee-based communication network in compliance with said prescribed contact schedule.
8 Assignments
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A supervisory system and method automatically tracks and reports the status, e.g., current address, employer, telephone number, etc., of a group of enrollees, and automatically collects a fee for such service. Each enrollee "reports in" to a host CPU of the system in accordance with a specific contact schedule, e.g., once a month, through a fee-based telephone network that automatically charges a prescribed toll fee to the originating telephone number whenever telephone contact remains established for more than a preamble time period. The host CPU, using individual calling line identification (ICLID) information included in the incoming telephone call, identifies the telephone number of the incoming call and determines if it belongs to an enrollee of the system. If not, the incoming call is disconnected before the preamble time period expires, thereby preventing the incoming caller from being charged the toll fee. Further, if a given enrollee attempts to report in more than once during the same reporting period, the incoming call is disconnected before the preamble time period expires, thereby preventing the incoming caller from being charged the toll fee more than once for a given reporting period. When valid telephone contact is established, the identify of the caller is verified to make sure it is an enrollee, and the verified enrollee then updates the status information, if needed. Reports are generated to selectively indicate which enrollees have or have not reported during the prescribed reporting period, and any change in their status.
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Citations
33 Claims
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1. An adaptable personnel supervisory system (PSS) comprising:
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a fee-based communication network that automatically charges a toll fee to a user thereof once telecommunicative contact has been established through the fee-based communication network with a host unit for a specified preamble time period; a central processing unit (CPU) coupled to said fee-based communication network; a memory coupled to said CPU having enrollment data stored therein that identifies enrollees who are under an obligation to contact said PSS in accordance with a prescribed contact schedule; and control means for controlling the operation of said CPU to provide a specified supervisory function, said control means including; answering means for automatically answering an incoming call over said fee-based telephone network, call verification means for verifying before the expiration of said preamble time period whether the incoming call is a valid call, and if not for terminating the incoming call before the toll fee is charged, a valid call comprising an incoming call from one of said enrollees in accordance with the prescribed contact schedule, whereby the toll fee is not charged unless the incoming call is valid, prompting means responsive to said verifying means for prompting a given enrollee who has made a valid call to said PSS to provide selected information, recording means for recording any selected information provided by the given enrollee in response to the prompting means, and report means for selectively generating host reports that selectively identify which enrollees have not made contact with the host unit, which enrollees have made contact with the host unit, and the selected information provided by the enrollees who have made contact with the host unit; whereby each enrollee is automatically charged the toll fee whenever he or she contacts the PSS by means of a valid call placed through said fee-based communication network in compliance with said prescribed contact schedule. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
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10. An adaptable personnel monitoring and identification system for monitoring the status of a group of enrollees, each enrollee in said group of enrollees being obligated to regularly report his or her status, said system comprising:
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a telephone network, said telephone network including means for providing individual calling line identification (ICLID) information on all telephone calls; a central processing unit (CPU) coupled to said telephone network, said CPU having a memory wherein status information relating to each enrollee in said group of enrollees is stored, said status information including at least the enrollee'"'"'s name and address; means for a given enrollee to establish telecommunicative contact with said CPU from a telephone coupled to said telephone network; said CPU having an administrative case load management control program stored therein that controls said CPU for the purpose of automatically verifying the status of the given enrollee of said group of enrollees once contact with said CPU has been established through said telephone network, and a speech generation module for prompting the given enrollee with specific instructions; said administrative case load management control program including means for automatically;
(1) verifying the identity of said given enrollee once telecommunicative contact is established with said CPU, (2) verifying that the given enrollee has contacted the CPU within an obligated contact time period, and (3) verifying whether there has been a change in the status of the given enrollee since the status information was last stored in the CPU memory. - View Dependent Claims (11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17)
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18. An adaptable personnel monitoring and identification system for monitoring a population of individuals comprising:
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means for establishing telecommunicative contact between a given individual of said population of individuals, under obligation to make regular status reports, and a central processing unit (CPU), said CPU having status information stored therein for each individual of said population of individuals being monitored; an administrative case load management program stored in said CPU, said administrative case load management program including;
(1) means for verifying the identity of said given individual once telecommunicative contact is established with said CPU, and (2) means for automatically requesting from the given individual whether the status information stored in said CPU for said given individual has changed since said given individual last contacted said CPU; andmeans for automatically charging said given individual with a prescribed fee once the identify of the given individual has been verified. - View Dependent Claims (19, 20, 21, 22)
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23. A method of automatically charging a fee to an enrollee of a supervisory system whenever said enrollee makes telephone contact with a host CPU of said supervisory system pursuant to a prescribed telephone contact schedule, said method comprising the steps of:
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(a) assigning a specific fee-based telephone number to said host CPU, said fee-based telephone number being controlled through a telephone network to automatically charge a prescribed fee to a caller who calls the specific fee-based telephone number and remains in contact with the host CPU via said specific fee-based telephone number for more than a prescribed preamble time period; (b) storing enrollment data in a memory of said host CPU that identifies each enrollee and his or her telephone number from which the specific fee-based telephone number is to be called; (c) monitoring the incoming calls received at said host CPU through said specific fee-based telephone number during said preamble time period to determine if said incoming calls have originated from an enrollee'"'"'s telephone number stored in the memory of the host CPU; (d) automatically disconnecting, prior to the timing out of said preamble time period, any incoming call received through said specific fee-based telephone number that did not originate from one of the enrollee'"'"'s telephone numbers stored in the memory of the host CPU as determined in step (c), whereby said prescribed fee is not charged to an incoming call from any number other than one of said enrollee'"'"'s telephone numbers; (e) generating a speech message at said host CPU in response to any incoming call received through said specific fee-based telephone number that did originate from one of the enrollee'"'"'s telephone numbers stored in the memory of the host CPU as determined in step (c), said speech message instructing said given enrollee how to inform the host CPU of his or her current status, including whether such status has changed since the given enrollee last contacted the host CPU, said speech message and any corresponding response from the given enrollee lasting longer than said preamble time period, whereby said prescribed fee is charged to an enrollee who places an incoming call to said host CPU through said specific fee-based telephone number. - View Dependent Claims (24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33)
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Specification