Credit card information management system

• US 6,260,026 B1
• Filed: 07/25/1997
• Issued: 07/10/2001
• Est. Priority Date: 08/12/1996
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Kabusiki Kaisha Media Marketing Network, Sanyo Electric Company Limited (Panasonic Holdings Corporation), Tadashi Etoh
• Original Assignee: Kabushiki Kaisha Media Marketing Network, Sanyo Electric Company Limited (Panasonic Holdings Corporation), Tadashi Etoh
• Inventors: Suzuki, Seiji, Mitoh, Hironori, Nishimura, Naruto, Etoh, Tadashi, Yoshihara, Ryuuji, Suzuki, Hiromichi, Hiramatsu, Tatsuo, Sata, Masahiro, Seto, Masahiro, Tomida, Yoshikazu
• Primary Examiner(s): COSIMANO, EDWARD R
• Application Number:
  US08/900,839
• Time in Patent Office: 1,446 Days
• Field of Search: 235/375, 235/380, 395/200.3, 395/200.31, 705/1, 705/16, 705/17, 705/38, 709/200, 709/201
• US Class Current: 705/38
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/04 Payment circuits
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/20 Point-of-sale [POS] network systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/204 comprising interface for record bearing medium or carrier for electronic funds transfer or payment credit
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/403 Solvency checks
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/03 Credit; Loans; Processing thereof
• 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 7/1008 Active credit-cards provided with means to personalise their use, e.g. with PIN-introduction/comparison system

Abstract

The credit card information management system checks the creditability of a credit card intended to be used for purchase of goods or service by using the card information owned by member stores of credit companies. A host computer of the card management center outputs information regarding the validity or invalidity of a credit card of a customer member of a credit company as card information, a transmission facility wirelessly transmits digital data of the card information. A receiving facility of a member store receives radio signals of the card information and checks whether or not there is any missing of data. If any missing occurs, a transfer of the missed data is requested to the host computer. A terminal computer extracts only the card information necessary for one'"'"'s own store from the data outputted by the host computer and data outputted in response to the transfer request and stores the same in memory, and the terminal computer outputs judgement of validity or invalidity of a credit card inputted into a card reader.

Claims

1. A credit card information management system, comprising:

a host computer located at a card management center,

a transmission facility connected to the host computer for broadcasting wirelessly digital data signals of card information in the host computer, said card information including classification of validity of credit cards of customer members of a credit company and information of creditability,

receiving facilities equipped in member stores of the credit company for receiving the digital data signals broadcasted by the transmission facility,

card readers located at the member stores for reading the credit cards of credit card users,

terminal computers located at the member stores and connected to the respective receiving facilities to receive the digital data signals therefrom, each of the terminal computer receiving the card information broadcasted through the transmission facility, selecting the card information for each of the member stores, storing including renewing the selected card information in a memory and outputting a card information of a credit card inputted into the card reader, each terminal computer having a modem, a data extracting feature, a memory feature, a data missing detection feature, a request feature, a transmission feature and a receiving feature, said data extracting feature extracting a specified portion of digital data outputted from the receiving facility and outputting the data to the memory feature and the data missing detection feature, said memory feature storing the data outputted from the data extracting feature and data inputted from the receiving feature to compensate the missing data, said data missing detection feature analyzing correction between output from the data extracting feature and the data received in a past and outputting a data request instruction to the request feature by detecting missing data, said request feature requesting data of the missing portion to the transmission feature if there is a missing portion, said transmission feature sending request data of the missing portion to the host computer, and said receiving feature receiving data corresponding to the missing portion responded by the host computer and outputting the same to the memory feature, and

telephone lines connected between the host computer and the respective terminal computers through the modems,

wherein said host computer has a function of responding to the terminal computer to send the missing data through the telephone line upon request from the terminal computer so that in case the terminal computer finds that there is the missing data in the received card information, the terminal computer requests the missing data to the host computer through the telephone line, and stores the missing data in the memory after receiving the missing data from the host computer through the telephone line.

2. A credit card information management system as set forth in claim 1, wherein said transmission facility is an FM multiplex broadcasting facility, and said receiving facilities of the member stores receive the card information broadcasted in FM multiplex, each terminal computer extracting only the card information necessary for its own use and storing the card information in the memory, judgement of validity of a credit card inputted into the card reader and output of creditability information of a customer member being carried out on the basis of content of the memory.

3. A credit card information management system as set forth in claim 1, wherein said data missing detection feature checks continuity of packets with respect to a series of data packets from the data extracting feature and judges a missing of data when no continuity is confirmed.

4. A credit card information management system as set forth in claim 3, wherein the packets are composed of prefixes and data blocks.