Networked automated document processing system and method

• US 6,724,926 B2
• Filed: 01/08/2002
• Issued: 04/20/2004
• Est. Priority Date: 05/13/1996
• Status: Expired due to Term

• Current Assignee: Cummins-Allison Corporation (Crane Company)
• Original Assignee: Cummins-Allison Corporation (Crane Company)
• Inventors: Mennie, Douglas U., Jones, John E., Jones, William J., Jones, Paul A.
• Primary Examiner(s): Johns, Andrew W.
• Application Number:
  US10/041,156
• Publication Number:
  US 20020154807A1
• Time in Patent Office: 833 Days
• Field of Search: 382/135, 382/137, 382/138, 382/173, 382/282, 356/71, 340/5.86, 209/534, 902/6, 902/7, 235/379, 705/35, 705/39, 705/42, 705/43, 705/45
• US Class Current: 382/135
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/10 Office automation; Time management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/042 characterized in that the payment protocol involves at least one cheque
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/0425 the cheque being electronic only
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/10 specially adapted for electronic funds transfer [EFT] systems; specially adapted for home banking systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/105 involving programming of a portable memory device, e.g. IC cards, "electronic purses"
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/108 Remote banking, e.g. home banking
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/1085 involving automatic teller machines [ATMs]
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/18 involving self-service terminals [SST], vending machines, kiosks or multimedia terminals
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/20 Point-of-sale [POS] network systems
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/00 Finance; Insurance; Tax strategies; Processing of corporate or income taxes
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/02 Banking, e.g. interest calculation or account maintenance credit or loans G06Q40/03
• CPC Class Codes: G06T 1/00 General purpose image data processing
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 30/10 Character recognition
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 30/127 with the intervention of an operator
• CPC Class Codes: G06V 30/274 Syntactic or semantic context, e.g. balancing
• CPC Class Codes: G07D 11/50 Sorting or counting valuable papers
• CPC Class Codes: G07D 7/04 Testing magnetic properties of the materials thereof, e.g. by detection of magnetic imprint G07D7/01 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G07D 7/06 using wave or particle radiation
• CPC Class Codes: G07D 7/12 Visible light, infrared or ultraviolet radiation
• CPC Class Codes: G07D 7/1205 Testing spectral properties
• CPC Class Codes: G07D 7/20 : Testing patterns thereon G07D7/004, G07D7/005 take precedence
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 19/20 : Automatic teller machines [ATMs]
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 19/202 : Depositing operations within ATMs depositing in general G07D11/00
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 19/207 : Surveillance aspects at ATMs
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 7/04 : by paper currency

Abstract

A document processing system comprises an input receptacle for receiving documents. A transport mechanism receives the documents from the input receptacle and transports the documents past a full image scanner and a discrimination unit. An output receptacle receives the documents from the transport mechanism after being transported past the full image scanner and the discrimination unit. The full image scanner includes means for obtaining a full video image of said documents, means for obtaining a image of a selected area of said documents, and means for obtaining information contained in said selected area of said document. The discrimination unit includes means for determining the authenticity of said document. A system controller directs the flows of documents over the transport mechanism.

Claims

1. A system for processing documents comprising:

a multitude of compact image processing units coupled together to form a network, each unit comprising;

an input receptacle for receiving documents;

an image scanner;

a discrimination unit;

a transport mechanism coupled to the input receptacle for receiving the documents from the input receptacle and transporting the documents past the image scanner and the discrimination unit;

an output receptacle for receiving documents from the transport mechanism after the documents have been transported past the image scanner and the discrimination unit;

the image scanner being adapted to obtain video images of the documents, the scanner further being adapted to recognize fields within the documents and to extract information from the fields;

the discrimination unit including an authenticator adapted to determine the authenticity of the documents; and

an interface adapted to communicate extracted field information; and

an outside accounting system connected to the interface of each of the image processing units, the outside accounting system being adapted to update financial accounts associated with the documents.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the output receptacle is a single bin.

3. The system of claim 2, further comprising a stacking wheel comprising flexible blades positioned to restack documents in the single bin.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein the output receptacle is two bins.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein one of the two bins is an off sort bin.

6. The system of claim 4, further comprising a stacking wheel comprising flexible blades positioned to restack documents in each of the two bins.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the output receptacle is a plurality of bins.

8. The system of claim 7, wherein one of the plurality of bins is an off sort bin.

9. The system of claim 7, further comprising a stacking wheel comprising flexible blades positioned to restack documents in each of the plurality of bins.

10. The system of claim 1, further comprising a communications panel adapted to communicate operational instructions to a user.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein the outside accounting system is adapted for storing, tracking, and analyzing the extracted field information received from each of the image processing units.

12. The system of claim 1, further comprising a discriminator functionality associated with the scanner for automatically authenticating the documents using the extracted field information.

13. The system of claim 1, wherein the documents have wide and narrow dimensions and the documents are transported with their wide dimension parallel to a direction of transport.

14. The system of claim 1, wherein the documents have wide and narrow dimensions and the documents are transported with their narrow dimension parallel to a direction of transport.

15. The system of claim 1, wherein the multitude of image processing units are located at teller windows and retailers.

16. The system of claim 1 wherein the documents comprise financial institution documents.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the financial institution documents comprise at least one of checks, deposit slips, withdrawal slips, loan payment documents, and cash tickets.

18. The system of claim 1 wherein the documents comprise currency bills.

19. The system of claim 1, wherein the transport mechanism is further adapted to process at a rate of at least 800 documents per minute.

22. The system of claim 2, further comprising a stacking wheel comprising flexible blades positioned to restack documents in the single bin.

20. A system for processing documents comprising:

a multitude of image processing units communicatively coupled together to form a network, each of the units comprising;

an input receptacle for receiving documents;

an image scanner;

a transport mechanism coupled to the input receptacle for receiving the documents from the input receptacle and transporting the documents past the image scanner;

an output receptacle for receiving the documents from the transport mechanism after being transported past the image scanner;

the image scanner being adapted to obtain video images of the documents, the scanner further being adapted to recognize fields within the documents and to extract information from the fields; and

an interface adapted to communicate the information extracted from selected fields of the documents; and

an outside accounting system, connected to the interface of each of the image processing units, processing deposits to and withdrawals from personalized accounts associated with the documents.

21. The system of claim 20, wherein the output receptacle is a single bin.

23. The system of claim 20, wherein the output receptacle is two bins.

24. The system of claim 23, wherein one of the two bins is an off sort bin.

25. The system of claim 20, further comprising a stacking wheel comprising flexible blades positioned to restack documents in each of the two bins.

26. The system of claim 20, wherein the output receptacle is a plurality of bins.

27. The system of claim 26, wherein one of the plurality of bins is an off sort bin.

28. The system of claim 26, further comprising a stacking wheel comprising flexible blades positioned to restack documents in each of the plurality of bins.

29. The system of claim 20, wherein the outside accounting system is a deposit system which credits personalized accounts based on the extracted field information.

30. The system of claim 20, wherein the outside accounting system is a withdrawal system which debits personalized accounts based on the extracted field information.

31. The system of claim 20, further comprising a teller monitor coupled to display document images.

32. The system of claim 20, wherein the documents have wide and narrow dimensions and the documents are transported with their wide dimension parallel to a direction of transport.

33. The system of claim 20, wherein the documents have wide and narrow dimensions and the documents are transported with their narrow dimension parallel to a direction of transport.

34. The system of claim 20, wherein the transport mechanism is further adapted to process at a rate of at least 800 documents per minute.

35. The system of claim 20 wherein the documents comprise financial institution documents.

36. The system of claim 35, wherein the financial institution documents comprise checks, deposit slips, withdrawal slips, loan payment documents, and cash tickets.

37. The system of claim 20 wherein the documents comprise currency bills.

38. A method for processing documents comprising:

connecting a multitude of compact image processing units together to form a network;

processing documents at each image processing unit, the processing comprising;

receiving documents in an input receptacle;

transporting the documents from the input receptacle past an image scanner and a discrimination unit to an output receptacle;

obtaining by the image scanner of images of the documents;

recognizing fields within the documents;

extracting information from the fields;

determining by the discrimination unit the authenticity of the documents; and

communicating extracted field information to an outside accounting system; and

updating by the outside accounting system of financial accounts associated with the documents.

39. The method of claim 38, wherein the output receptacle is a single bin.

40. The method of claim 39, wherein the processing of documents further comprises restacking documents in the single bin.

41. The method of claim 38, wherein the output receptacle is two bins.

42. The method of claim 41, wherein one of the two bins is an off sort bin.

43. The method of claim 41, wherein the processing of documents further comprises restacking documents in each of the two bins.

44. The method of claim 38, wherein the output receptacle is a plurality of bins.

45. The method of claim 44, wherein one of the plurality of bins is an off sort bin.

46. The method of claim 44, wherein the processing of documents further comprises restacking documents in each of the plurality of bins.

47. The method of claim 38, further including the steps of storing, tracking, and analyzing, by the outside accounting system, of the information received from each of the image processing units.

48. The method of claim 38, wherein the processing of documents further comprises authenticating, by the scanner, the documents using the extracted field information.

49. The method of claim 38, wherein the documents have wide and narrow dimensions and the transporting of documents is performed with their narrow dimension parallel to a direction of transport.

50. The method of claim 38 wherein the documents comprise financial institution documents.

51. The method of claim 50, wherein the financial institution documents comprise at least one of checks, deposit slips, withdrawal slips, loan payment documents, and cash tickets.

52. The method of claim 38 wherein the documents comprise currency bills.

53. The method of claim 38, wherein the transporting of documents is performed at a rate of at least 800 documents per minute.

54. A method for processing documents comprising:

coupling a multitude of image processing units communicatively together to form a network;

processing documents in each of the image processing units, the processing of documents comprising;

receiving documents in an input receptacle;

transporting the documents from the input receptacle past an image scanner to an output receptacle;

obtaining by the image scanner of images of the documents;

recognizing fields within the documents;

extracting information from the fields; and

communicating the information extracted from selected fields of the document to an outside accounting system; and

processing deposits to and withdrawals from personalized accounts associated with the documents [automatically and substantially immediately].

55. The method of claim 54, wherein the output receptacle is a single bin.

56. The method of claim 55, wherein the processing of documents further comprises restacking documents in the single bin.

57. The method of claim 54, wherein the output receptacle is two bins.

58. The method of claim 57, wherein one of the two bins is an off sort bin.

59. The method of claim 57, wherein the processing of documents further comprises restacking documents in each of the two bins.

60. The method of claim 54, wherein the output receptacle is a plurality of bins.

61. The method of claim 60, wherein one of the plurality of bins is an off sort bin.

62. The method of claim 60, wherein the processing of documents further comprises restacking documents in each of the plurality of bins.

63. The method of claim 54, wherein the updating by the outside accounting system performs a deposit which credits personalized accounts based on the extracted field information.

64. The method of claim 54, wherein the updating by the outside accounting system performs a withdrawal which debits personalized accounts based on the extracted field information.

65. The method of claim 54, further comprising displaying of document images.

66. The method of claim 54, wherein the documents have wide and narrow dimensions and the transporting of documents conveys the documents with their narrow dimension parallel to a direction of transport.

67. The method of claim 54, wherein the transporting of documents conveys at a rate of at least 800 documents per minute.

68. The method of claim 54 wherein the documents comprise financial institution documents.

69. The method of claim 68, wherein the financial institution documents comprise checks, deposit slips, withdrawal slips, loan payment documents, and cash tickets.

70. The method of claim 54 wherein the documents comprise currency bills.