DETAILED ACTION
This communication is in response to the amendment filed 5/11/26 in which claims 1 and 8 were amended. Claims 1-15, 17, 20-23 are currently pending.
Notice of Pre-AIA or AIA Status
The present application, filed on or after March 16, 2013, is being examined under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA .
Response to Arguments
Applicant’s arguments with respect to claims 1 and 8 have been considered but are moot because the new ground of rejection does not rely on any reference applied in the prior rejection of record for any teaching or matter specifically challenged in the argument.
Allowable Subject Matter
Claims 15, 17, 20, and 21 are allowed.
Claim Rejections - 35 USC § 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103 (or as subject to pre-AIA 35 U.S.C. 102 and 103) is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis (i.e., changing from AIA to pre-AIA ) for the rejection will not be considered a new ground of rejection if the prior art relied upon, and the rationale supporting the rejection, would be the same under either status.
The following is a quotation of 35 U.S.C. 103 which forms the basis for all obviousness rejections set forth in this Office action:
A patent for a claimed invention may not be obtained, notwithstanding that the claimed invention is not identically disclosed as set forth in section 102, if the differences between the claimed invention and the prior art are such that the claimed invention as a whole would have been obvious before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to a person having ordinary skill in the art to which the claimed invention pertains. Patentability shall not be negated by the manner in which the invention was made.
The factual inquiries for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 U.S.C. 103 are summarized as follows:
1. Determining the scope and contents of the prior art.
2. Ascertaining the differences between the prior art and the claims at issue.
3. Resolving the level of ordinary skill in the pertinent art.
4. Considering objective evidence present in the application indicating obviousness or non-obviousness.
Claims 1, 2, 5, 7, 8, 11, 12, 14, and 22 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hwu (US 8,554,645 B1; patented Oct. 8, 2013) in view of Chow (US 2007/0226785 A1; published Sep. 27, 2007) and Svede (US 2021/0392131 A1; published Dec. 16, 2021).
Regarding claim 1, Hwu discloses [a] system, comprising:
a computing device comprising a processor and a memory; and (fig. 1 (CPU 121, memory 124))
machine-readable instructions stored in the memory that, when executed by the processor, cause the computing device to at least: (fig. 1 (on-line financial management system 123))
register, in a user account, a linked provider in association with an automatic submission criterion and a submission template for a provider service of the linked provider, the submission template specifying how to complete submissions for the provider service, (13:25—35 (“In one embodiment, on-line financial management system 123 includes any on-line financial management system such as, but not limited to: an on-line personal financial management system; an on-line business financial management system; an on-line personal accounting system; an on-line business accounting system; an on-line tax preparation and/or management system; an on-line healthcare management system; or any other an on-line personal and/or business data management system, as discussed herein, and/or as known in the art at the time of filing, and/or as developed after the time of filing.”), 9:55—60 (“In one embodiment, data representing electronic versions of one or more forms [submission template] associated with the reporting requirements [automatic submission criterion] for the specific jurisdiction and/or agency [linked provider] is obtained and stored.”)) the automatic submission criterion comprising a merchant identifier for identifying a respective merchant in a respective transaction record and the automatic submission criterion being linked to the submission template (8:9-16 (“In one embodiment, the financial transaction data [respective transaction record] associated with the business is analyzed by one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems using at least part of the current vendor reporting requirement data to try and identify/match one or more vendors [merchant identifier for identifying a respective merchant] used by the business that are Subject to the reporting requirement and therefore require the preparation and Submission of one or more of the one or more forms [submission template] associated with the reporting requirement.”)).
Hwu does not expressly disclose:
transmit, to the provider service, an authentication token to authenticate a user identity based at least in part on an authentication request, the authentication token being issued by an authentication service; (but see Chow ¶ 49 (“For example, client 104 may desire authentication to the authentication service 102(m) [e.g., authentication service] and access to resources 114(s) from a plurality of service providers 110(1) and 110(2) [e.g., provider service]. Communication module 208 may be configured to generate a request 126 [e.g., authentication request] seeking an authentication token 216(j) [e.g., authentication token] and service tokens 218(k) corresponding to each of the desired service providers 110(1), 110(2). Client 104 may accordingly communicate a request 126 having credentials 120 to authentication service 102(m). Authentication module 116(m) may be executed to authenticate the client 104, e.g., by verifying credentials. Upon authentication service manager module 118(m) may be executed to generate a response 122(r) for communication to client 104 having a plurality of tokens 124 including an authentication token 216 and services tokens 218(1), 218(2) corresponding respectively to service providers 110(1), 110(2). Client 104 receives the response 122 which in FIG. 2 is depicted as stored in memory 210 of client 104 and includes a plurality of tokens 124, and which further includes authentication token 216 and a plurality of service tokens 218(1), 218(2). The received plurality of tokens 124 may be used by the client 104 to prove identity of the client 104 at the corresponding authentication service 102(m) and service providers 110(s) respectively, without requiring submission of credentials.”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu to incorporate the teachings of Chow to provide an authentication token issued by an authentication service, to a client for authentication to a service provider, at least because doing so would enable a user to engage in multiple security token transaction techniques with a single transaction and avoid remembering and entering different credentials to access different resources. See Chow ¶¶ 1-3.
Hwu further discloses receive, in association with the user account, a transaction record comprising transaction data; and (6:37—38 (“In one embodiment, data representing electronic versions of one or more forms associated with the reporting requirements for the specific jurisdiction and/or agency is obtained and stored.”), 8:28—39 (“In one embodiment: financial transaction data associated with the business that is related to the identified subject vendors, such as the actual amount spent with the subject vendors, dates of the transactions, and/or items purchased; identification data associated with the subject vendors, such as the subject vendor's EIN/SSN or tax ID number; contact data associated with the subject vendors; contact data associated with any required reporting agency; and data representing the one or more required forms, is automatically gathered and correlated to the respective identified subject vendors using one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems.”))
in an instance in which the automatic submission criterion matches the transaction record, complete and transmit a submission to the provider service…wherein the submission is completed according to the submission template and based at least in part on the transaction data (3:17-38 (“Consequently, using the method and system for determining business expenditures with vendors and automatically generating and submitting required forms, as discussed herein, the business owner [user identity] is spared the considerable burden and use of resources currently required for: tracking expenditures with all vendors; identifying subject vendors with which the business spends some threshold amount, or more; obtaining the proper identification and contact information for each subject vendor, such as the subject vendor's EIN/SSN number; gathering the expenditure data associated with all the subject vendors; obtaining the appropriate one or more forms required; using the expenditure data to fill out one or more required forms, for each subject vendor; submitting the required forms to the each subject vendor and/or the proper agency; and then creating and retaining proof of these actions for each subject vendor. As a result, using the method and system for determining business expenditures with vendors and automatically generating and submitting required forms, as discussed herein, a business owner can devote these saved resources to creating a more efficient and profitable business, thereby benefitting both the business and the economy as a whole.”), 8:8-16 (“In one embodiment, the financial transaction data associated with the business is analyzed by one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems using at least part of the current vendor reporting requirement data to try and identify/match one or more vendors used by the business that are subject to the reporting requirement and therefore require the preparation and submission of one or more of the one or more forms associated with the reporting requirement.”), 8:62—9:6 (“In one embodiment: the financial transaction data associated with the business that is related to the identified subject vendors, such as the actual amount spent with the subject vendors, dates of the transactions, and/or items purchased; the identification data associated with the subject vendors, such as the subject vendor's EIN/SSN or tax ID number; the contact data associated with the subject vendors; and the contact data associated with any required reporting agency is used to automatically fill out, i.e., “auto-fill” the one or more required forms for each identified subject vendor; thereby transforming the one or more required forms into filled out, or completed, or partially completed, forms.”), 9:23-29 (“In one embodiment, the auto-filled forms associated with the reporting requirement for each of the identified subject vendors are then automatically, or semi-automatically, sent to the respective vendors, and/or the appropriate reporting agency, using the identification data associated with subject vendors and the data representing current vendor reporting requirements.”)).
Hwu and Chow do not expressly disclose that the auto-filled forms submitted on behalf of the business owner to the appropriate reporting agency are submitted based at least in part on the authentication of the provider service on behalf of the user identity using the authentication token (but see Svede ¶ 3 (“Various aspects disclosed herein include methods that may be implemented on a processor of a computing device for management of access credentials. In some embodiments, the computing device may include a token management network element. Various embodiments may include receiving from a client application support service an authentication request to authenticate a client application, sending a response comprising an authentication token to the client application support service, receiving from the client application support service a request for an access token to access a target system application program interface (API), and sending a response comprising the access token to the client application support service to enable the client application support service to access the target system API using the access token on behalf of the client application. The client application may be executing on a device remote from the client application support service, such as a mobile device or a wireless device.”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu and Chow to incorporate the teachings of Svede to use the issued authentication on behalf of the user by an application that received the token from the user, at least because doing so would enable a system to retain and rotate a plurality of access credentials on behalf of a client application. See Svede ¶ 19.
Regarding claim 2, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 1 as discussed above. Hwu further discloses wherein the machine-readable instructions further cause the computing device to at least:
retrieve, from the user account, user data specified in the submission template, wherein the submission is completed based at least in part on the user data that is retrieved (9:10—22 (“As a specific example, in the case of the 1099 reporting requirement of the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010 (Pub.L. 111-152, 124 Stat. 1029): the financial transaction data associated with the business that is related to the identified subject vendors with whom the business spent $600.00 or more in the previous tax year; the identification data associated with the subject vendors with whom the business spent $600.00 or more in the previous tax year; and the contact data associated with the subject vendors with whom the business spent $600.00 or more in the previous tax year is used to auto-fill a 1099 for each identified subject vendor with whom the business spent $600.00 or more in the previous tax year.”)).
Regarding claim 5, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 1 as discussed above. Hwu further discloses wherein the machine-readable instructions further cause the computing device to at least identify the linked provider based at least in part on an item listed in the transaction record (8:9—16 (“In one embodiment, the financial transaction data associated with the business is analyzed by one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems using at least part of the current vendor reporting requirement data to try and identify/match one or more vendors used by the business that are subject to the reporting requirement and therefore require the preparation and submission of one or more of the one or more forms associated with the reporting requirement.”)).
Regarding claim 7, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 1 as discussed above. Hwu further discloses wherein the machine-readable instructions further cause the computing device to at least periodically identify new transaction records associated with a user (30:1—4 (“In one embodiment at EXIT OPERATION 231 process for determining business expenditures with vendors and automatically generating and submitting required forms 200 is exited to await new data.”)).
Regarding claim 8, Hwu discloses [a] method, comprising:
storing, in association with a user account, an automatic submission criterion and a submission template for a provider service, the submission template specifying how to complete submissions for the provider service, (13:25—35 (“In one embodiment, on-line financial management system 123 includes any on-line financial management system such as, but not limited to: an on-line personal financial management system; an on-line business financial management system; an on-line personal accounting system; an on-line business accounting system; an on-line tax preparation and/or management system; an on-line healthcare management system; or any other an on-line personal and/or business data management system, as discussed herein, and/or as known in the art at the time of filing, and/or as developed after the time of filing.”), 9:55—60 (“In one embodiment, data representing electronic versions of one or more forms associated with the reporting requirements for the specific jurisdiction and/or agency is obtained and stored.”)) the automatic submission criterion comprising a merchant identifier for identifying a respective merchant in a respective transaction record and the automatic submission criterion being linked to the submission template; (8:9-16 (“In one embodiment, the financial transaction data [respective transaction record] associated with the business is analyzed by one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems using at least part of the current vendor reporting requirement data to try and identify/match one or more vendors [merchant identifier for identifying a respective merchant] used by the business that are Subject to the reporting requirement and therefore require the preparation and Submission of one or more of the one or more forms [submission template] associated with the reporting requirement.”)).
Hwu does not expressly disclose:
transmitting, to the provider service, an authentication credential to authenticate a user identity based at least in part on an authentication request, the authentication credential being issued by an authentication service; (but see Chow ¶ 49 (“For example, client 104 may desire authentication to the authentication service 102(m) [e.g., authentication service] and access to resources 114(s) from a plurality of service providers 110(1) and 110(2) [e.g., provider service]. Communication module 208 may be configured to generate a request 126 [e.g., authentication request] seeking an authentication token 216(j) [e.g., authentication token] and service tokens 218(k) corresponding to each of the desired service providers 110(1), 110(2). Client 104 may accordingly communicate a request 126 having credentials 120 to authentication service 102(m). Authentication module 116(m) may be executed to authenticate the client 104, e.g., by verifying credentials. Upon authentication service manager module 118(m) may be executed to generate a response 122(r) for communication to client 104 having a plurality of tokens 124 including an authentication token 216 and services tokens 218(1), 218(2) corresponding respectively to service providers 110(1), 110(2). Client 104 receives the response 122 which in FIG. 2 is depicted as stored in memory 210 of client 104 and includes a plurality of tokens 124, and which further includes authentication token 216 and a plurality of service tokens 218(1), 218(2). The received plurality of tokens 124 may be used by the client 104 to prove identity of the client 104 at the corresponding authentication service 102(m) and service providers 110(s) respectively, without requiring submission of credentials.”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu to incorporate the teachings of Chow to provide an authentication token issued by an authentication service, to a client for authentication to a service provider, at least because doing so would enable a user to engage in multiple security token transaction techniques with a single transaction and avoid remembering and entering different credentials to access different resources. See Chow ¶¶ 1-3.
Hwu further discloses receiving, in association with the user account, a transaction record comprising transaction data; and (6:37—38 (“In one embodiment, data representing electronic versions of one or more forms associated with the reporting requirements for the specific jurisdiction and/or agency is obtained and stored.”), 8:28—39 (“In one embodiment: financial transaction data associated with the business that is related to the identified subject vendors, such as the actual amount spent with the subject vendors, dates of the transactions, and/or items purchased; identification data associated with the subject vendors, such as the subject vendor's EIN/SSN or tax ID number; contact data associated with the subject vendors; contact data associated with any required reporting agency; and data representing the one or more required forms, is automatically gathered and correlated to the respective identified subject vendors using one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems.”))
in an instance in which the automatic submission criterion matches the transaction record, completing and transmitting a submission to the provider service…wherein the submission is completed according to the submission template and based at least in part on the transaction data (3:17-38 (“Consequently, using the method and system for determining business expenditures with vendors and automatically generating and submitting required forms, as discussed herein, the business owner [user identity] is spared the considerable burden and use of resources currently required for: tracking expenditures with all vendors; identifying subject vendors with which the business spends some threshold amount, or more; obtaining the proper identification and contact information for each subject vendor, such as the subject vendor's EIN/SSN number; gathering the expenditure data associated with all the subject vendors; obtaining the appropriate one or more forms required; using the expenditure data to fill out one or more required forms, for each subject vendor; submitting the required forms to the each subject vendor and/or the proper agency; and then creating and retaining proof of these actions for each subject vendor. As a result, using the method and system for determining business expenditures with vendors and automatically generating and submitting required forms, as discussed herein, a business owner can devote these saved resources to creating a more efficient and profitable business, thereby benefitting both the business and the economy as a whole.”), 8:8-16 (“In one embodiment, the financial transaction data associated with the business is analyzed by one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems using at least part of the current vendor reporting requirement data to try and identify/match one or more vendors used by the business that are subject to the reporting requirement and therefore require the preparation and submission of one or more of the one or more forms associated with the reporting requirement.”), 8:62—9:6 (“In one embodiment: the financial transaction data associated with the business that is related to the identified subject vendors, such as the actual amount spent with the subject vendors, dates of the transactions, and/or items purchased; the identification data associated with the subject vendors, such as the subject vendor's EIN/SSN or tax ID number; the contact data associated with the subject vendors; and the contact data associated with any required reporting agency is used to automatically fill out, i.e., “auto-fill” the one or more required forms for each identified subject vendor; thereby transforming the one or more required forms into filled out, or completed, or partially completed, forms.”), 9:23-29 (“In one embodiment, the auto-filled forms associated with the reporting requirement for each of the identified subject vendors are then automatically, or semi-automatically, sent to the respective vendors, and/or the appropriate reporting agency, using the identification data associated with subject vendors and the data representing current vendor reporting requirements.”)).
Hwu does not expressly disclose that the auto-filled forms submitted on behalf of the business owner to the appropriate reporting agency are submitted based at least in part on the authentication of the provider service on behalf of the user identity using the authentication token (but see Svede ¶ 3 (“Various aspects disclosed herein include methods that may be implemented on a processor of a computing device for management of access credentials. In some embodiments, the computing device may include a token management network element. Various embodiments may include receiving from a client application support service an authentication request to authenticate a client application, sending a response comprising an authentication token to the client application support service, receiving from the client application support service a request for an access token to access a target system application program interface (API), and sending a response comprising the access token to the client application support service to enable the client application support service to access the target system API using the access token on behalf of the client application. The client application may be executing on a device remote from the client application support service, such as a mobile device or a wireless device.”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu and Chow to incorporate the teachings of Svede to use the issued authentication on behalf of the user by an application that received the token from the user, at least because doing so would enable a system to retain and rotate a plurality of access credentials on behalf of a client application. See Svede ¶ 19.
Regarding claim 11, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 8 as discussed above. Hwu further discloses identifying a linked provider based at least in part on a merchant identifier specified in the transaction record, wherein the linked provider is associated with the provider service (8:9—16 (“In one embodiment, the financial transaction data associated with the business is analyzed by one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems using at least part of the current vendor reporting requirement data to try and identify/match one or more vendors used by the business that are subject to the reporting requirement and therefore require the preparation and submission of one or more of the one or more forms associated with the reporting requirement.”)).
Regarding claim 12, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 8 as discussed above. Hwu further discloses identifying a linked provider based at least in part on an item listed in the transaction record, wherein the linked provider is associated with the provider service (8:9—16 (“In one embodiment, the financial transaction data associated with the business is analyzed by one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems using at least part of the current vendor reporting requirement data to try and identify/match one or more vendors used by the business that are subject to the reporting requirement and therefore require the preparation and submission of one or more of the one or more forms associated with the reporting requirement.”)).
Regarding claim 14, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 8 as discussed above. Hwu further discloses periodically identifying new transaction records associated with a user (30:1—4 (“In one embodiment at EXIT OPERATION 231 process for determining business expenditures with vendors and automatically generating and submitting required forms 200 is exited to await new data.”)).
Regarding claim 22, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 1 as discussed above. Hwu further discloses identify the linked provider associated with the transaction record based at least in part on the transaction data (8:9-16 (“In one embodiment, the financial transaction data associated with the business is analyzed by one or more processors associated with one or more computing systems using at least part of the current vendor reporting requirement data to try and identify/match one or more vendors used by the business that are subject to the reporting requirement and therefore require the preparation and submission of one or more of the one or more forms associated with the reporting requirement.”)).
Claims 3 and 10 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hwu, Chow, and Svede as applied to claims 1 and 8 above, and further in view of Quass (US 2002/0083068 A1; published Jun. 27, 2002).
Regarding claim 3, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 1 as discussed above. Hwu does not expressly disclose wherein the machine-readable instructions that cause the computing device to complete the submission further cause the computing device to at least use machine learning to determine where to place individual portions of transaction data within the submission (but see Quass Abstract (“A collection of classifiers and their support components, whose composition is largely determined by the specific information being sought and whose implementation may employ techniques from the field of machine learning, are applied to features exposed by the transformations in general and the object model in particular, to make decisions about which forms to fill out, how to populate form fields, and how to cause forms to be submitted.”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu to incorporate the teachings of Quass to use machine learning to make decisions about how to populate form fields, at least because doing so would enable filling out a diversity of forms. See Quass ¶ 6.
Regarding claim 10, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 8 as discussed above. Hwu does not expressly disclose wherein completing the submission further comprises using machine learning to determine where to place individual portions of transaction data within the submission (but see Quass Abstract (“A collection of classifiers and their support components, whose composition is largely determined by the specific information being sought and whose implementation may employ techniques from the field of machine learning, are applied to features exposed by the transformations in general and the object model in particular, to make decisions about which forms to fill out, how to populate form fields, and how to cause forms to be submitted.”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu to incorporate the teachings of Quass to use machine learning to make decisions about how to populate form fields, at least because doing so would enable filling out a diversity of forms. See Quass ¶ 6.
Claims 4 and 9 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hwu, Chow, and Svede as applied to claims 1 and 8 above, and further in view of Larson (US 2020/0366671 A1; published Nov. 19, 2020).
Regarding claim 4, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 1 as discussed above. Hwu does not expressly disclose wherein the machine-readable instructions further cause the computing device to at least:
authenticate with the provider service prior to transmitting the submission to the provider service (but see Larson ¶ 5 (“In order to authenticate a user's identity, many identity verification services utilize identity information from physical identifying documents, images or videos of physical identifying documents, authentication or authorization credentials, identity scores, biometric data, or knowledge-based authentication (KBA) data. The identity information may be provided to the identity verification service (directly or through the businesses/government agencies) physically or electronically (e.g., entering and submitting identity information to an authentication mechanism via a web form).”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu to incorporate the teachings of Larson to authenticate the user before submission of the form to the agency, at least because doing so would ensure that information provided by the user is associated with the identity of a real person. See Larson ¶ 4.
Regarding claim 9, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 8 as discussed above. Hwu does not expressly disclose authenticating with the provider service prior to transmitting the submission to the provider service (but see Larson ¶ 5 (“In order to authenticate a user's identity, many identity verification services utilize identity information from physical identifying documents, images or videos of physical identifying documents, authentication or authorization credentials, identity scores, biometric data, or knowledge-based authentication (KBA) data. The identity information may be provided to the identity verification service (directly or through the businesses/government agencies) physically or electronically (e.g., entering and submitting identity information to an authentication mechanism via a web form).”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu to incorporate the teachings of Larson to authenticate the user before submission of the form to the agency, at least because doing so would ensure that information provided by the user is associated with the identity of a real person. See Larson ¶ 4.
Claims 6 and 13 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hwu, Chow, and Svede as applied to claims 1 and 8 above, and further in view of Woelfer (US 2020/0118230 A1; published Apr. 16, 2020).
Regarding claim 6, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 1 as discussed above. Hwu does not expressly disclose wherein the machine-readable instructions further cause the computing device to at least:
present a user interface to a client device, the user interface listing the transaction record; and (but see Woelfer ¶ 47 (“User device 102 may be any electronic device capable of performing the functions attributed to it herein. For example, a user device 102 may be configured to present details related to one or more transactions to a user.”))
obtain a selection of the transaction record from the client device (but see Woelfer ¶ 47 (“In some embodiments, the user device 102 may enable submission of a request for additional transaction details related to a particular transaction. For example, upon selection of a particular transaction via the user device 102, the user device may enable a user to submit a request for additional information via a button displayed on a graphical user interface (GUI).”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu to incorporate the teachings of Woelfer to present the financial transactions and receive a selection of a particular transaction for submission, at least because doing so would enable manual selection of specific transactions.
Regarding claim 13, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 8 as discussed above. Hwu does not expressly disclose presenting a user interface to a client device, the user interface listing the transaction record; and (but see Woelfer ¶ 47 (“User device 102 may be any electronic device capable of performing the functions attributed to it herein. For example, a user device 102 may be configured to present details related to one or more transactions to a user.”))
obtaining a selection of the transaction record from the client device (but see Woelfer ¶ 47 (“In some embodiments, the user device 102 may enable submission of a request for additional transaction details related to a particular transaction. For example, upon selection of a particular transaction via the user device 102, the user device may enable a user to submit a request for additional information via a button displayed on a graphical user interface (GUI).”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have modified Hwu to incorporate the teachings of Woelfer to present the financial transactions and receive a selection of a particular transaction for submission, at least because doing so would enable manual selection of specific transactions.
Claim 23 is rejected under 35 U.S.C. 103 as being unpatentable over Hwu, Chow, and Svede as applied to claim 1 above, and further in view of Wyle (US 2006/0155618 A1; published Ju1. 13, 2006).
Regarding claim 23, Hwu, in view of Chow and Svede, discloses the invention of claim 1 as discussed above. Hwu does not expressly disclose wherein the machine-readable instructions that cause the computing device to complete the submission further cause the computing device to at least perform an optical character recognition technique to determine where to insert a portion of the transaction data into a form associated with the submission (but see Wyle ¶ 41 (“The computer system 200 inserts, enables or displays the page of the electronic source document and an input form 805 having a plurality of input fields 810 corresponding to the form type 608 (S-516, S-522). That is, based on the form type 805, the plurality of input fields 810 are predetermined and are retrieved from the memory 410. The data entry operator or the tax preparer inputs the numbers shown on the page 800 into the corresponding input fields 810 on the input form 805 (S-518, S-524). The input fields 810 use the same descriptions as those in the electronic source document. For example, the phrase "Box 1: Wages, Tips and Other Compensation" is on both the page 800 and the input form 805. Hence, the lower skilled data entry operator can easily input the correct numbers from the page 800 into the corresponding input fields 810. Alternatively, the OCR system scans the page and inserts the appropriate number into the corresponding input field 810 on the input form 805. As shown in FIG. 8, the numbers input are 80000, 12000, 4960, and 1162. The references may also assist the OCR system in identifying the number corresponding to the input field 810. In one embodiment, one or more data entry operators and/or one or more OCR systems may input information for a particular page for verifying the accuracy of the inputted numbers. The data entry operator and/or the OCR system can move from one page of the electronic source document to another page of the electronic source document or from one electronic source document to another electronic source document. After data entry is complete and/or verified, the data entry operator may select a submit icon 815 indicating to the tax preparer that the page of the electronic source document has been completed. The inputted information is then merged into the tax return.”)).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of the claimed invention to have further modified Hwu to incorporate the teachings of Wyle to use OCR to fill out the required forms, at least because doing so would automate the data entry aspect of filling out the required forms.
Conclusion
Applicant's amendment necessitated the new ground(s) of rejection presented in this Office action. Accordingly, THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. See MPEP § 706.07(a). Applicant is reminded of the extension of time policy as set forth in 37 CFR 1.136(a).
A shortened statutory period for reply to this final action is set to expire THREE MONTHS from the mailing date of this action. In the event a first reply is filed within TWO MONTHS of the mailing date of this final action and the advisory action is not mailed until after the end of the THREE-MONTH shortened statutory period, then the shortened statutory period will expire on the date the advisory action is mailed, and any nonprovisional extension fee (37 CFR 1.17(a)) pursuant to 37 CFR 1.136(a) will be calculated from the mailing date of the advisory action. In no event, however, will the statutory period for reply expire later than SIX MONTHS from the mailing date of this final action.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to SHAHID KHAN whose telephone number is (571)270-0419. The examiner can normally be reached M-F, 9-5 est.
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/SHAHID K KHAN/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 2146