Method and Apparatus for Integrated Image Capture for Vehicles to Track Damage

• US 20150032580A1
• Filed: 07/24/2014
• Published: 01/29/2015
• Est. Priority Date: 07/25/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: The Crawford Group Incorporated (Jack Taylor Family Voting Trust U A D 4 14 99)
• Original Assignee: The Crawford Group Incorporated (Jack Taylor Family Voting Trust U A D 4 14 99)
• Inventors: Altermatt, John Allan, Boruff, Kelli Jane, Crawford, Matthew Lynn, Matroni, Robert Noah
• Granted Patent: US 10,410,278 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/28
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0645 Rental transactions; Leasing transactions
• CPC Class Codes: H04N 7/181 for receiving images from a plurality of remote sources

Abstract

Methods, apparatuses, and computer program products are disclosed for building a consolidated searchable database of vehicle images that were captured at a plurality of different sites. The database can be searched to track vehicle condition over time and over a plurality of transactions involving the vehicles. From this information, a determination can be made as to whether damage first arose on a vehicle during a particular transaction for the purpose of allocating responsibility for payment of repair costs.

Claims

1. A method comprising:

receiving, from a plurality of sites, a plurality of vehicle images and metadata for the vehicle images, each vehicle image comprising an image of a vehicle that is indicative of whether body damage is present on that vehicle, the metadata comprising an identifier for each vehicle depicted in the vehicle images and a temporal identifier indicative of when each vehicle image was created; and

creating a searchable multi-site database of the received vehicle images indexed by the received metadata; and

wherein the receiving and creating steps are performed by a processor.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the vehicle images are rental vehicle images, and wherein the sites are rental sites.

3. The method of claim 2 further comprising:

generating the rental vehicle images via a plurality of cameras, wherein the rental vehicle images comprise a plurality images of a plurality of rental vehicles from a plurality of angles such that each of at least a plurality of the rental vehicles has images thereof from a plurality of angles.

4. The method of claim 2 further comprising:

the processor accessing rental agreement data stored in a memory, the rental agreement data being representative of a plurality of rental agreements for a plurality of rental transactions with respect to a plurality of rental vehicles;

the processor processing the accessed rental agreement data and the received metadata;

the processor determining a plurality of rental agreements corresponding to the received vehicle images based on the processed rental agreement data and the processed metadata; and

the processor storing the received rental vehicle images in a memory in association with their determined corresponding rental agreements to index a plurality of the rental vehicle images by their determined corresponding rental agreements.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein the rental agreement data comprises condition report data for the rental vehicles corresponding to the rental transactions, the condition report data comprising data indicative of a condition for each rental transactions'"'"' rental vehicle, the method further comprising:

the processor associating the received rental vehicle images with the condition report data for the determined corresponding rental agreements.

6. The method of claim 4 further comprising:

the processor receiving data indicative of a body damage report for a rental vehicle; and

the processor performing the accessing, processing, and storing steps for that rental vehicle in response to the received body damage report data.

7. The method of claim 4 further comprising:

the processor receiving data indicative of a rental agreement being opened for a rental transaction with respect to a rental vehicle; and

the processor performing the accessing, processing, and storing steps for that rental vehicle in response to the received rental agreement opening data.

8. The method of claim 4 further comprising:

the processor receiving data indicative of a rental agreement being closed for a rental transaction with respect to a rental vehicle; and

the processor performing the accessing, processing, and storing steps for that rental vehicle in response to the received rental agreement closing data.

9. The method of claim 4 further comprising:

the processor performing the accessing, processing, and storing steps each time a new rental vehicle image is received.

10. The method of claim 2 wherein the received metadata further comprises a rental site identifier for each rental site at which the received rental vehicle images were taken.

11. The method of claim 10 wherein the received metadata further comprises an arrival/departure identifier, the arrival/departure identifier configured to identify whether a rental vehicle image corresponds to an image of a rental vehicle arriving at or departing from a rental site.

12. The method of claim 11 further comprising:

providing a user interface for a user to search the database for rental vehicle images that are associated with a user-specified value for the received metadata.

13. The method of claim 2 further comprising generating a plurality of the rental vehicle images via a plurality of rental site gate cameras, and wherein a plurality of the rental vehicle images comprise the rental site gate camera images.

14. The method of claim 2 further comprising generating a plurality of the rental vehicle images via a plurality of mobile cameras at a plurality of the rental sites during customer pickup, and wherein a plurality of the rental vehicle images comprise the rental vehicle images generated by the mobile cameras.

15. The method of claim 2 further comprising:

the processor accessing condition report data stored in a memory, the condition report data corresponding to a plurality of condition reports and comprising data indicative of a condition for a plurality of rental vehicles with respect to a plurality of rental transactions;

the processor processing the accessed condition report data and the received metadata;

the processor determining a plurality of condition reports corresponding to the received vehicle images based on the processed condition report data and the processed metadata; and

the processor storing the received rental vehicle images in a memory in association with their determined corresponding condition reports to index a plurality of the rental vehicle images by their determined corresponding condition reports.

16. The method of claim 1 further comprising:

the processor providing a web service interface for communicating with a plurality of gate camera systems at a plurality of the sites, the web service interface defining a standardized format for the vehicle images and the metadata;

wherein the receiving step comprises the web service interface (1) receiving a plurality of the vehicle images and their corresponding metadata in the standardized format from the gate camera systems, and (2) validating the received vehicle images and their corresponding metadata from the gate camera systems against the standardized format; and

the processor performing the creating step for the validated vehicle images and their corresponding metadata.

17. The method of claim 1 wherein the vehicle images comprise a plurality of vehicle images that were taken at a start of a transaction and a plurality of vehicle images that were taken at an end of a transaction such that a body damage condition can be assessed for the vehicles with respect to each transaction for those vehicles.

18. A system comprising:

a plurality of gate cameras at a plurality of rental sites, the gate cameras configured to generate a plurality of images of rental vehicles as the rental vehicles arrive at or depart from the rental sites; and

a computer system in communication with the gate cameras, wherein the computer system comprises;

a database in which is stored at least one member of the group consisting of (1) rental agreement data, the rental agreement data being representative of a plurality of rental agreements for a plurality of rental transactions with respect to a plurality of rental vehicles, and (2) condition report data, the condition report data corresponding to a plurality of condition reports and comprising data indicative of a condition for a plurality of rental vehicles with respect to a plurality of rental transactions; and

wherein the computer system is configured to;

receive the rental vehicle images from the gate cameras, the gate camera rental vehicle images being associated with metadata, the metadata comprising an identifier for each rental vehicle depicted in the gate camera rental vehicle images and a temporal identifier indicative of when each gate camera rental vehicle image was created;

search the database based on the metadata for the gate camera rental vehicle images to automatically pair each of a plurality of the gate camera rental vehicle images with the at least one member that corresponds to a rental transaction in common between the subject gate camera rental vehicle image and the subject at least one member;

store the paired gate camera rental vehicle images in the database; and

create a plurality of associations in the database between the paired gate camera rental vehicle images and each at least one member paired thereto to thereby make the database a searchable multi-rental site database of gate camera rental vehicle images that have been associated with their corresponding at least one member.

19. The system of claim 18 wherein the computer system further comprises:

a server;

a plurality of rental site computer systems in communication with the server over a network, wherein each rental site computer system is also in communication with a gate camera and is configured to (1) receive a plurality of gate camera rental vehicle images from the gate camera with which it is in communication, and (2) communicate to the server a plurality of the gate camera rental vehicle images it receives and the metadata for those gate camera rental vehicle images; and

wherein the server is configured to (1) receive the gate camera rental vehicle images and their corresponding metadata from the rental site computer systems, and (2) perform the database search operation, the rental vehicle images storage operation, and the associations creation operation based on the gate camera rental vehicle images and their corresponding metadata received from the rental site computer systems.

20. The system of claim 18 wherein the computer system further comprises:

a gate camera web service interface, the gate camera web service interface configured to (1) define a standardized format for the gate camera rental vehicle images and their corresponding metadata, (2) receive a plurality of the gate camera rental vehicle images and their corresponding metadata, (3) validate the received gate camera rental vehicle images and their corresponding metadata against the standardized format; and

wherein the computer system is further configured to perform the database search operation, the rental vehicle images storage operation, and the associations creation operation based on the validated gate camera rental vehicle images and their corresponding metadata.

21. The system of claim 20 further comprising:

a plurality of mobile devices at a plurality of rental sites, each mobile device comprising (1) a mobile application configured to open or close a plurality of rental transactions for customers in response to user input, and (2) a mobile camera configured to generate a plurality of mobile camera images of a plurality of rental vehicles in relation to the rental transactions in coordination with the mobile application;

wherein the mobile application is further configured to (1) generate condition report data for the rental transactions in response to user input, and (2) create metadata for the mobile camera rental vehicle images, wherein the metadata for the mobile camera rental vehicle images comprises (i) an identifier for each rental vehicle depicted in the mobile camera rental vehicle images, and (ii) an association with the generated condition report data for each rental transaction relating to the subject mobile camera rental vehicle image;

wherein the computer system further comprises;

a service program; and

a mobile services interface, the mobile services interface configured to interface the mobile devices with the service program to communicate (1) a plurality of the mobile camera rental vehicle images and their corresponding metadata and (2) the generated condition report data to the service program;

wherein the service program is configured to (1) process the communicated condition report data, (2) update the database based on the processed condition report data, and (3) store the communicated mobile camera rental vehicle images and their corresponding in the database to thereby make the database a searchable multi-rental site database of mobile camera rental vehicle images that have been associated with their corresponding condition report data.

22. The system of claim 18 further comprising:

a plurality of readers at a plurality of the rental sites, each reader configured to automatically detect a machine-readable code on each of a plurality of rental vehicles as those rental vehicles arrive at or depart from the rental sites where the readers are located; and

wherein the computer system is in communication with the readers and further configured to generate the vehicle identifier metadata for a plurality of the gate camera rental vehicle images based on the detected machine-readable codes.

23. The system of claim 18 wherein the computer system is further configured to (1) perform image processing on a plurality of the gate camera rental vehicle images, (2) extract license plate information for a plurality of rental vehicles based on the image processing, and (3) generate the vehicle identifier metadata for a plurality of the gate camera rental vehicle images based on the extracted license plate information.

24. The system of claim 18 further comprising:

a plurality of the rental vehicles that are equipped with vehicle telematics, the vehicle telematics configured to communicate a plurality of vehicle identifiers for those rental vehicles; and

wherein the computer system is further configured to (1) receive the vehicle identifiers from the rental vehicles equipped with the vehicle telematics as those rental vehicles arrive at or depart from the rental sites, and (2) generate the vehicle identifier metadata for a plurality of the gate camera rental vehicle images based on the vehicle identifiers received via the vehicle telematics.

25. A method comprising:

receiving a plurality of rental vehicle images from a plurality of rental sites;

receiving metadata associated with the received rental vehicle images; and

for at least a plurality of the received rental vehicle images, (1) processing their associated metadata, (2) automatically creating a data association in a memory between at least a plurality of those rental vehicle images with at least one of a condition report and a rental agreement for the rental vehicles depicted by those rental vehicle images; and

wherein the method steps are performed by a processor.

26. The method of claim 25, wherein the rental vehicle images depict a plurality of rental vehicles with respect to at least one member of the group consisting of (1) at a start of a rental transaction, (2) at an end of a rental transaction, (3) arriving at a rental site, and (4) departing from a rental site.

27. A method comprising:

receiving, from a plurality of rental sites, a plurality of rental vehicle images and metadata for the rental vehicle images, each rental vehicle image comprising an image of a rental vehicle that is indicative of whether body damage is present on that rental vehicle, the metadata comprising an identifier for each rental vehicle depicted in the rental vehicle images and a temporal identifier indicative of when each rental vehicle image was created;

accessing data stored in a memory representative of a plurality of condition reports, the condition report data corresponding to a plurality of rental transactions for a plurality of rental vehicles, each condition report comprising data indicative of a condition for each rental transactions'"'"' rental vehicle;

processing the accessed condition report data and the received metadata;

determining which of the received rental vehicles and which of the accessed condition reports correspond to the same rental transactions based on the processed condition report data and the processed metadata; and

in response to a determination that a rental vehicle image corresponds to a condition report, creating an association in a memory between that rental vehicle image and that condition report; and

wherein the receiving, accessing, processing, determining, and creating steps are performed by a processor.