Relationship management system and process for pricing financial instruments based on a customer's relationship with a financial institution

• US 6,049,782 A
• Filed: 05/31/1996
• Issued: 04/11/2000
• Est. Priority Date: 05/31/1996
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Citibank (South Dakota) NA (Citigroup Incorporated)
• Original Assignee: Citibank (South Dakota) NA (Citigroup Incorporated)
• Inventors: Spivak, Michael, Gottesman, Sidney, Murthy, Jay, Eletto, Patricia, Gurdus, Ben, Santariello, Bob, Shuman, Darlene
• Primary Examiner(s): Stamber, Eric W.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Kanof, Pedro R.
• Application Number:
  US08/655,924
• Time in Patent Office: 1,411 Days
• Field of Search: 705/35, 705/36, 705/40, 705/38, 705/39, 705/42
• US Class Current: 705/36.00R
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/10 specially adapted for electronic funds transfer [EFT] systems; specially adapted for home banking systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/102 Bill distribution or payments
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/108 Remote banking, e.g. home banking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/02 Banking, e.g. interest calculation or account maintenance credit or loans G06Q40/03
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/03 Credit; Loans; Processing thereof
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/06 Asset management; Financial planning or analysis

Abstract

A system and process for use by a financial institution to facilitate relationship pricing in connection with a single account that includes a plurality of account components, including a checking component, a savings component and a investment component. The system includes software engines operated on specially programmed general purpose computers. The engines are sub-systems that generate input and drive another sub-system or the product processors. The overall function of the engines is to, among other things, allow pricing to be determined based on a customer'"'"'s total individual or household relationship to the financial institution. The preferred system includes a rate engine, a pricing engine, a linkage engine, a balance engine, and a cycle engine.

Claims

1. An integrated financial system comprising:

at least one account that includes a plurality of account components wherein each account component has a time of opening and a time of statement cycling and wherein each account component of the plurality of account components has an associated price based on a premium/discount interest rate and wherein the associated price is also based on a customer'"'"'s relationship to a financial institution; and

a relationship management system, the relationship management system including;

a general purpose programmable computer;

means for centralizing the capture, storage, and access to a plurality of interest rates corresponding to at least some of the account components;

means for generating a database of account component relationships;

means for generating balance files;

means for determining the associated pricing of individual account components in terms of premium/discount interest rates applicable to a first account component of the plurality of account components at the time of the first account component'"'"'s opening and statement cycling based on the customer'"'"'s relationship to the financial institution using the database of account component relationships and the balance files; and

means for adjusting the associated pricing of individual account components.

2. The integrated financial system of claim 1 wherein the relationship management system further comprises cycling means for determining a list of account components for cycling on a given day and generating driver files to obtain account component information from at least one component product processor.

3. The integrated financial system of claim 1, wherein the customer'"'"'s relationship to the financial institution includes account components of others within a household associated with the customer.

4. The integrated financial system of claim 1, wherein the at least one account includes a credit card component that is taken into account in determining the pricing of other account components.

5. The integrated financial system of claim 1, wherein the at least one account includes a secured credit component that is taken into account in determining the pricing of other account components.

6. The integrated financial system of claim 1, wherein the at least one account includes a money market component that is taken into account in determining the pricing of other account components.

7. The integrated financial system of claim 1, wherein the at least one account includes a retirement component that is taken into account in determining the pricing of other account components.

15. The integrated financial system of claim 1 wherein one of the accounts includes at least one of the following account components:

a checking component;

a savings component and an investment component.

8. A method of determining prices associated with account components wherein the account components are grouped into accounts comprising:

centralizing the capture, storage, and access to a plurality of premium/discount interest rates corresponding to at least one account component;

automatically generating a database of account component relationships;

automatically generating balance files;

automatically determining the pricing of the at least one account component in terms of premium/discount interest rates applicable to the at least one account component based on the customer'"'"'s relationship to the financial institution; and

automatically adjusting the premium/discount interest rates applicable to the at least one account component.

9. The process of claim 8, further comprising determining a list of account components for cycling on a given day and generating driver files to obtain account component information from at least one component product processor.

10. The process of claim 8, further comprising:

utilization of account components of others within a household associated with the customer.

11. The process of claim 8, wherein one of the accounts includes a credit card component that is taken into account in determining the pricing of other account components.

12. The process of claim 8, wherein one of the accounts includes a secured credit component that is taken into account in determining the pricing of other account components.

13. The process of claim 8, wherein one of the accounts includes a money market component that is taken into account in determining the pricing of other account components.

14. The process of claim 8, wherein one of the accounts includes a retirement account component that is taken into account in determining the pricing of other account components.

16. The process of claim 8 wherein one of the accounts includes at least one of the following account components:

checking component;

a savings component and an investment component.

17. The method of claim 8 wherein determining the pricing of the at least one account component occurs at the time of the at least one account component'"'"'s opening and statement cycling.

18. A method for pricing financial instruments based on a customer'"'"'s relationship to a financial institution, comprising:

initiating a pricing determination process for a customer, wherein the customer has at least one account with the financial institution;

determining links, cycle codes, and pricing indicators for the at least one account for the user;

transmitting links, cycle codes, and pricing indicators for the at least one account for the user to a linkage engine;

the linkage engine determining customer relationship information;

transmitting the customer relationship information to a relationship pricing/balance database;

transmitting balance data from a balance database to a balance engine;

the balance engine transferring and aggregating balance data;

transmitting the transferred and aggregated balance data to the relationship pricing/balance database;

transmitting the customer relationship information and the transferred and aggregated balance data from the relationship pricing/balance database to a pricing engine;

transmitting rate information for the at least one account for the customer to a rate engine;

the rate engine making rate determinations;

transmitting the rate determinations to the pricing engine;

the pricing engine returning a pricing determination based on a premium/discount interest rate and transmitting the pricing determination to a statement cycling engine and

the statement cycling engine creating driver files, statement files, and pricing files and adjusting the pricing of the at least one account.

19. A computer system for pricing financial instruments based on a customer'"'"'s relationship to a finical institution, comprising:

a balance engine;

a pricing engine;

a linkage engine;

a rate engine;

a relationship pricing/balance database; and

a Global Customer Information Facility (GCIF);

wherein the balance engine receives balances of various accounts held by a customer and updates the balances stored within the relationship pricing/balance database;

wherein the linkage engine forwards account information stored within the GCIF to the relationship pricing/balance database;

wherein the rate engine forwards rates, rules and tiers from various tables to the pricing engine; and

wherein the relationship pricing/balance database forwards data to the pricing engine and the pricing engine forwards the appropriate fees and interest rates to the financial institution so it is applied to the customer'"'"'s individual accounts.

20. The computer system of claim 19 further comprising:

a cycling engine wherein the cycling engine prepares written statements for the customer based on the information provided to it by the relationship pricing/balance database.

21. A method of determining a customer'"'"'s price and interest rates of various accounts comprising:

accessing a rate database which stores base interest rates for account components provided by a financial institution;

updating a relationship pricing/balancing database to reflect changes in an account component balance;

accessing a centralized database which stores information which is used to determine relationships between accounts;

wherein a cycling engine detects changes made in the relationship pricing/balancing database on a periodic basis such that the rate database and centralized database are used to determine what pricing scheme a particular account component receives based on the customer'"'"'s relationship with the financial institution; and

using the determined pricing scheme to adjust an interest applied to the particular account component.

22. The method of claim 21 comprising the step of

organizing and maintaining the prices within the price table to reflect different prices for similar products held by different customers.

23. The method of claim 21 comprising the step of

organizing and maintaining the prices into a plurality of tiers.

24. The method of claim 21 comprising the step of using the customer'"'"'s household relationship with the financial institution in order to determine the customer'"'"'s prices and interest rates.