On-line payments facility

• US 8,374,961 B2
• Filed: 09/10/2010
• Issued: 02/12/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 06/24/2005
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Wells Fargo Bank NA (Wells Fargo & Company)
• Original Assignee: Wells Fargo Bank NA (Wells Fargo & Company)
• Inventors: Vancini, Adam E., Dailey, Timothy J., Gann, Candie L., Coffing, Timothy L., Riter, Nancy T., Vaishampayan, Ajay, Clark, Aric B.
• Primary Examiner(s): Nguyen, Nga B.
• Application Number:
  US12/879,839
• Publication Number:
  US 20100332386A1
• Time in Patent Office: 886 Days
• Field of Search: 705/39, 705/40, 705/41, 705/42, 705/43
• US Class Current: 705/42
• 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 20/105 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 30/04 Billing or invoicing
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/02 Banking, e.g. interest calculation or account maintenance credit or loans G06Q40/03

Abstract

A computer system implements a counterparty management module and a payment module for processing employee direct payroll deposits. The counterparty management module permits an employer to add employee bank accounts to a funds transfer system provided by a banking institution. The employee bank accounts are respectively associated with different employees of the employer. The employer has a bank account at the banking institution. The counterparty management module is accessible to the employer by way of an online banking area of a website of the banking institution. The counterparty management module also permits the employer to specify a payroll-related pay group that includes the employee bank accounts and to specify characteristics of the transferring of funds to the pay group as a whole. The payment module generates payment instructions for transferring funds from the employer bank account to the employee bank accounts.

Claims

1. A computer system for processing employee direct payroll deposits, comprising:

a computer-readable storage medium having instructions stored therein;

one or more processors executing the instructions stored in the computer-readable medium to implement

a counterparty management module to permit an employer to add employee bank accounts to a funds transfer system provided by a banking institution, the employee bank accounts being respectively associated with different employees of the employer, the employer having a bank account at the banking institution, the counterparty management module being accessible to the employer by way of an online banking area of a website of the banking institution, including to

provide screens to the employer by way of the Internet,

permit the employer to specify, by providing responses to prompts contained in the screens, a payroll-related pay group that includes the employee bank accounts and to specify characteristics of the transferring of funds to the pay group as a whole,

permit the employer to specify, by providing responses to the prompts contained in the screens, bank account numbers for each of the employee bank accounts;

a payment module to generate payment instructions for transferring funds from the employer bank account to the employee bank accounts.

2. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the payment module permits the employer to transfer funds from the employer bank account to the employee bank account after verification of the employee bank account.

3. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the employer bank account includes a billing account number and a funding account number.

4. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the employee bank account is an internal counterparty account.

5. The computer system of claim 1, wherein the employee bank account is an external counterparty account.

6. A computer system for processing employee direct payroll deposits, comprising:

a computer-readable storage medium having instructions stored therein;

one or more processors executing the instructions stored in the computer-readable medium to implement

a counterparty management module to permit an employer to add employee bank accounts to a funds transfer system provided by a banking institution, the employee bank accounts being respectively associated with different employees of the employer, the employer having a bank account at the banking institution, the counterparty management module being accessible to the employer by way of an online banking area of a website of the banking institution, including to

provide screens to the employer by way of the Internet,

permit the employer to specify, by providing responses to prompts contained in the screens, a payroll-related pay group that includes the employee bank accounts and to specify characteristics of the transferring of funds to the pay group as a whole, including a time by which the funds are to be transferred,

permit the employer to specify, by providing responses to the prompts contained in the screens, bank account numbers for each of the employee bank accounts;

a payment module to

determine an electronic system to transfer funds to the employee bank accounts based on the received characteristics;

determine instructions for transferring funds over the determined electronic system for transferring funds from the employer bank account to each of the employee bank accounts; and

provide the determined instructions to the determined electronic system.

7. The computer system of claim 6, wherein the counterparty management module further permits the employer to specify a routing number and an account type for each of the employee bank accounts.

8. The computer system of claim 7, wherein the counterparty management module further permits the employer to specify a counterparty country.

9. The computer system of claim 6, wherein the electronic system includes one or more of an internal transfer, an ACH transfer, and a Fedwire transfer.

10. The computer system of claim 6, wherein the electronic system includes one or more of an internal transfer, an ACH transfer, a Fedwire transfer, and a SWIFT transfer.

11. The computer system of claim 6, wherein the funds are to be transferred to the employees in the pay group on a recurring basis, and wherein the characteristics of the time by which the funds are to be transferred comprise characteristics of recurring payments to be made to the employees in the pay group.

12. The computer system of claim 11, wherein the screens comprise a screen that configured to permit the employer to define the pay group, including assign a name to the pay group and select members of the pay group.

13. The computer system of claim 12, wherein the plurality of counterparty accounts comprises an internal account and an external account.

14. The computer system of claim 12, wherein the screens comprise a screen configured to prompt the employer to provide a payee memo to be provided to the employees upon the transferring of funds.