Merchandise dispensing by exchange of subsequently validated card symbols for article

• US 5,902,984 A
• Filed: 04/02/1997
• Issued: 05/11/1999
• Est. Priority Date: 10/12/1994
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Vensafe ASA
• Original Assignee: Mekatronikk AS (Ågotnes Sveis AS)
• Inventors: Planke, Tore
• Primary Examiner(s): Hajec, Donald
• Assistant Examiner(s): Dunn, Drew A.
• Application Number:
  US08/809,859
• Time in Patent Office: 769 Days
• Field of Search: 235/381, 235/383, 235/385, 186/55, 186/56
• US Class Current: 235/381
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/00 Mechanisms actuated by objects other than coins to free or to actuate vending, hiring, coin or paper currency dispensing or refunding apparatus
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/08 by coded identity card or credit card or other personal identification means without personal verification means G07F7/02
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/12 Card verification

Abstract

A system for the sale of consumer goods, where the purchase of an article, from a board (1) containing symbols of merchandise, collects symbols of articles (2) in the form of optically, magnetically or electronically readable cards (2). The card is preprogrammed, but not capable of being reprogrammed. A control unit (3) converts the article number of the card to an article price paid by the customer of the article, and transmits at least one unique serial number of the card via a connection (9; 15) to a comparator and controller unit (10) in a merchandise dispensing machine (11) to be stored as a validation signal for the specific card in a memory (13). The stored validation signal is compared with data on the card which is input and read (16) in the dispensing machine (11), the specific article being dispensed at the correspondence of said data, simultaneously with the validation of the card being deleted.

Claims

1. A system for the sale of consumer goods, where the purchaser of an article at a place of purchase collects one or more non-validated card symbol of the article on a readable card, where data carried on the symbol of the article on a readable card are read and registered, where such data are converted to an article price which is paid by the purchaser of the article, where the purchaser of the article receives a validated symbol of the article, and where the article is dispensed to the purchaser at a dispensing location in return for his/her depositing the validated symbol of the article on a readable card, the symbol of the article subsequently being invalidated, said system further comprising:

a merchandise dispensing machine where articles of merchandise corresponding to said article number are stored,

a comparator and controller unit mounted in the merchandise dispensing machine,

a card input having a card reader mounted in the merchandise dispensing machine for the input of said readable card and reading the data on the card,

transmitting means in a control unit for transmitting a validation signal to and storing it in the comparator and controller unit in the merchandise dispensing machine upon or subsequent to the registration of said article price, said validation signal being composed of at least said serial number,

a comparator section of said comparator and controller unit, adapted to receive the data read by the card reader and collate these with the data in said validation signal which are stored in the memory of the comparator section, and in the case of correspondence output an enabling signal to an controller section in said comparator and controller unit, and

actuating means for a merchandise dispensing machine adapted to receive a controller signal from said controller section and as a result of the controller signal effect the delivery to the customer of the paid number of article corresponding to said article number from a compartment for the supply of merchandise in said dispensing machine,

wherein said readable card is a preprogrammed, not reprogrammable card which is optically, magnetically or electronically readable, which forms the symbol of the article, and which contains data both in the form of a number for the article of merchandise and a serial number which is unique to the individual card, and

wherein said control unit is located at the place purchase where said data on the symbol of the article are read either by the readable area of the card being scanned by insertion of the card into a scanner device or by data on the card being manually read and loaded into the control unit.

2. The system according to claim 1, wherein the comparator section is adapted to delete the used validation signal from the memory of the comparator section, simultaneously with or subsequent to the output of the enabling signal.

3. The system according to claim 2 wherein said readable card is collected in the merchandise dispensing machine, each said card after having said validation symbol cancelled, being brought back to the place of purchase for repeated use.

4. The system according to one or more of claim 1, wherein said card is designed to carry a complete or partial representation of the article of merchandise.

5. The system disclosed in claim 1, wherein said consumer goods are selected from the group consisting of:

packs of cigarettes, cigars, snuff, pipe tobacco, tobacco for rolling cigarettes, or similar goods.

6. The system according to claim 1, wherein said place of purchase is a manually operated cash register.