Enterprise polling system for electronic cash registers

• US 7,243,841 B1
• Filed: 03/01/2005
• Issued: 07/17/2007
• Est. Priority Date: 03/01/2005
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Quiz Franchisor, LLC
• Original Assignee: Ba-Bing! LLC
• Inventors: Nelson, Mark N., Baumgartner, Andrew James
• Primary Examiner(s): Le; Thien Minh
• Application Number:
  US11/070,542
• Time in Patent Office: 868 Days
• Field of Search: 235/380, 235/375, 235/382, 235/382.5, 235/379, 235/381, 705/39, 705/10, 705/11, 705/12, 705/13, 705/4, 705/36.R
• US Class Current: 235/380
• CPC Class Codes: G07F 9/002 Vending machines being part of a centrally controlled network of vending machines
• CPC Class Codes: G07G 1/14 Systems including one or more distant stations co-operating with a central processing unit data transmission in general H04L; telemetry systems for selectively calling a substation from a main station H04Q9/00

Abstract

A method and system for transmitting information from a point of sale terminal such as an electronic cash register to a remote site. The system eliminates the need for a computer to operate the point of sale terminal at the store location. The system includes modifying the firmware of the point of sale terminal to store the data from the periodic transactional report of the terminal in data storage areas within the POS terminal. This data is later retrieved and transmitted to the remote central office or data warehouse.

Claims

1. A method for obtaining information from a commercially available electronic cash register that has programmable firmware, the method comprising the steps of:

modifying the programmable firmware to create at least one data storage area;

modifying the programmable firmware to store data relating to periodic reports of the transactions entered in the electronic cash register in the at least one data storage area;

retrieving the stored data from the at least one data storage area; and

transmitting the retrieved stored data to a remote host.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the method further comprises the step of storing additional information relating to the electronic cash register in the at least one data storage area.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the method further comprises the step of storing the data in a defined format.

4. The method of claim 1 wherein the method further comprises the step of providing a data sorting component that compiles the stored data regardless of the format of the stored data into a format that can be utilized in evaluating the stored data.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the method further comprises the steps of providing a plurality of data storage areas in the electronic cash register and storing data relating to transactions during different time periods in each of the plurality of data storage areas.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of retrieving the stored data comprises providing a polling client that retrieves the stored data from the at least one data storage area and transmits the stored data to a remote host computer.

7. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of transmitting the stored data comprises utilizing a dial-up modem to transmit the stored data to a remote host.

8. The method of claim 1 wherein the step of transmitting the stored data comprises utilizing satellite technology to transmit the stored data to a remote host.