Financial account information management and auditing

• US 8,099,345 B2
• Filed: 10/03/2007
• Issued: 01/17/2012
• Est. Priority Date: 04/02/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Bank of America Corp.
• Original Assignee: Bank of America Corp.
• Inventors: Stellhorn, David W., Andersen, David M.
• Primary Examiner(s): JOHNSON, GREGORY L
• Application Number:
  US11/866,498
• Publication Number:
  US 20080243715A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,567 Days
• Field of Search: 705/36.R
• US Class Current: 705/35
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/10 specially adapted for electronic funds transfer [EFT] systems; specially adapted for home banking 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: G06Q 40/06 Asset management; Financial planning or analysis
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/12 Accounting
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99931 Database or file accessing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99942 Manipulating data structure, e.g. compression, compaction, compilation

Abstract

A database-driven software application may be provided that is configured to keep a record of mainframe activity for various financial transactions and provide relationships between various transactional features. The information of these financial transactions may originate from a single system in a single data format or may be integrated into a single consistent format from a plurality of systems in a plurality of formats. Such an application may enable the reporting of anomalous events and/or the review of activities conducted by a financial associate (e.g., an employee of the financial institution) and/or those impacting a specific customer or account. The system may operate by parsing daily feeds of raw mainframe logs and extracting relevant details and placing information about each transaction in a data warehouse.

Claims

1. In a financial transaction management system, a method comprising:

storing in a first database first data representing a plurality of financial transactions;

storing in a second database second data referencing each of the financial transactions, including, for each of the financial transactions, an offset of the financial transaction within the first data;

compressing the first data to generate third data comprising a plurality of compressed data blocks each having a different offset of the respective data block within the third data;

for each of the financial transactions, associating the offset of the financial transaction in the first data with the offset of one of the compressed data blocks;

determining one of the financial transactions;

determining, by a computer, from the second data the offset of the identified financial transaction in the first data;

determining, by the computer, which of the compressed data blocks has an offset corresponding to the offset of the identified financial transaction;

retrieving, by the computer, data from the determined one of the compressed data blocks; and

decompressing, by the computer, the determined one of the compressed data blocks.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising causing, by the computer, data from the decompressed data block to be displayed on a display device.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising parsing the first data to identify each of the financial transactions and to identify characteristics of each of the transactions, wherein the second data comprises the characteristics, and wherein determining the financial transaction comprises:

receiving a query identifying a criterion;

comparing the criterion to the characteristics in the second data to determine the financial transaction based on the comparison.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the criterion comprises a financial account number.

5. A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing computer-executable instructions, such that when the computer-executable instructions are performed by a computer, the computer performs steps comprising:

storing in a first database first data representing a plurality of financial transactions;

storing in a second database second data referencing each of the financial transactions, including, for each of the financial transactions, an offset of the financial transaction within the first data;

compressing the first data to generate third data comprising a plurality of compressed data blocks each having a different offset of the respective data block within the third data;

for each of the financial transactions, associating the offset of the financial transaction in the first data with the offset of one of the compressed data blocks;

determining one of the financial transactions;

determining, from the second data, the offset of the identified financial transaction in the first data;

determining which of the compressed data blocks has an offset corresponding to the offset of the identified financial transaction;

retrieving data from the determined one of the compressed data blocks; and

decompressing the determined one of the compressed data blocks.

6. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 5, wherein the steps further comprise causing data from the decompressed data block to be displayed on a display device.

7. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 5, wherein the steps further comprise parsing the first data to identify each of the financial transactions and to identify characteristics of each of the transactions, wherein the second data comprises the characteristics, and wherein determining the financial transaction comprises:

receiving a query identifying a criterion;

comparing the criterion to the characteristics in the second data to determine the financial transaction based on the comparison.

8. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 7, wherein the criterion comprises a financial account number.