DETAILED ACTION
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
2. The Amendment filed on July 1, 2026 has been entered. The examiner acknowledges the amendments to claims 1 and 6.
Rejections under 35 U.S.C. § 101: Applicant argues that the claims are not merely directed to automating a manager’s business-continuity decision, but recite a specific computerized workflow management process that operates on staffing records in a defined sequence to update a schedule. The Examiner disagrees that the claims are not directed to the manager’s decision; noting that is exactly what the workflow management software does, as it informs and provides the results to the manager for implementation or action. The development of a schedule under dynamic circumstances may not be practically performable by a human, but the invention as disclosed does not indicate a practical application.
The additional elements are routine and expected components of an information processing system. There is no particular machine or manufacture integral to the claim, and no other application of the exception in a meaningful way beyond the linkage to the BCP or workflow management environment. The method described in claim 1 recites functions that would be expected to occur in the event of an outage to a facility. There are no indications of a new or unique application of new thought, innovation, or novel employment of existing components. In a non-automated environment, each of these functions would be expected to be executed by managers (humans) as part of assigned duties. The value that automation provides in speeding up the process and enabling larger volumes of processing is acknowledged yet the invention does not disclose integration of an additional element beyond general linking to a technology. The amendments provide additional detail to the manipulation of data within the workforce management software, but does not expand the inventive scope beyond a software improvement. Improvements to the performance of a computer/processor are not apparent or documented, and the invention does not actively monitor or control a process. As disclosed, the invention provides a schedule, adjusted for dynamic conditions and regenerates dependent scheduling objects, updates persisted staffing records, removes obsolete scheduling records, and maintains consistency across multiple scheduling units and databases. This presents itself as software applied on a processor and does not constitute a practical application. In view of this, the request to withdraw the rejections under 35 U.S.C § 101 is denied.
Claim Rejections – 35 U.S.C. § 101
35 U.S.C. § 101 reads as follows:
Whoever invents or discovers any new and useful process, machine, manufacture, or composition of matter, or any new and useful improvement thereof, may obtain a patent therefor, subject to the conditions and requirements of this title.
Claims 1-4, 6 are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 101 because the claimed invention is
directed to non-statutory subject matter. The claims, 1-4, 6 are directed to a judicial exception (i.e., law of nature, natural phenomenon, abstract idea) without providing significantly more.
Step 1
Step 1 of the subject matter eligibility analysis per MPEP § 2106.03, required the claims to be a process, machine, manufacture or a composition of matter. Claims 1-4, 6 are directed to a process (method), machine (system), which are statutory categories of invention.
Step 2A
Claims 1-4, 6 are directed to abstract ideas, as explained below.
Prong one of the Step 2A analysis requires identifying the specific limitation(s) in the claim under examination that the examiner believes recites an abstract idea, and determining whether the identified limitation(s) falls within at least one of the groupings of abstract ideas of mathematical concepts, mental processes, and certain methods of organizing human activity.
Step 2A-Prong 1
The claims recite the following limitations that are directed to abstract ideas, which can be summarized as being directed to a method, the abstract idea, of redistributing workload under dynamic conditions in a multiple location contact center.
Claim 1 discloses a method, comprising: Claim 1 discloses a method, comprising: distributing workload of a working-shift of a source-location to working-shifts in target-locations, in a multiple-locations contact center, (following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion), said method comprising:
(i) receiving a rebalancing-request and workload-information of the working-shift of the source location,
wherein said workload-information comprising: one or more source Scheduling Units
(SU)s, one or more target SUs, and percentage-allocation for each critical-skill in one
or more critical-skills, (following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion),
(ii) parsing the workload-information to extract one or more affected-SUs from the received one or more source SUs, one or more target SUs and the critical-skills; (following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion),
(iii) for each parallel time-interval in a parallel working-shift of each target-location in the target locations and for each critical-skill in the critical-skills:
a. retrieving staffing plans of the one or more target SUs, maintaining staffing requirements per skill per scheduling unit (following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion), and
b. marking the parallel time-interval as overstaffed for the critical-skill based on a net-staffing calculation; (following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion),
(iv) operating agents-distribution for each parallel time-interval in the parallel working shift of each target-location and for each critical-skill in the critical-skills based on the parallel time-intervals marked as overstaffed; (following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion), and
(v) to:
a. update staffing plans of parallel working-shift of each target-location in the
target locations, based on the operated agents-distribution; using staffing records or critical-skills, (following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion),
b. regenerate and persist an updated staffing plan and generate new-schedules for agents in the one or more target SUs using the updated staffing plan based on
the updated staffing plans of parallel working-shift of each target-location in the target locations to be stored, (following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion), and
c. remove existing schedules of the affected-SUs of parallel working-shift,
(following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion),
wherein said method is implemented and operated by a service provider.
Additional limitations employ the method by marking a parallel time-interval as overstaffed when a number of agents required for the parallel time interval is less than the number of agents scheduled for the parallel time interval, (following rules or instructions, observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion - claim 2), with agent distribution performed by distributing agents from the overstaffed time periods at the source location to the target locations for those time periods, (following rules or instructions ,observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion – claim 3), receiving a period of work-shift distribution, operating distribution of workload, and viewing successful staffing plans, (following rules or instructions ,observation, evaluation, judgement, opinion - claim 4).
Each of these claimed limitations involving organizing human activity, managing personal behavior, following rules or instructions, and employ mental processes including observation, evaluation, judgement, and opinion.
Claim 6 recites similar abstract ideas as those identified with respect to claims 1-4.
Thus, the concepts set forth in claims 1-4, 6 recite abstract ideas.
Step 2A-Prong 2
As per MPEP § 2106.04, while the claims 1-4, 6 recite additional limitations which are hardware or software elements such as a computer, a computerized-method, a staffing-database; an agents-schedules database, a Workforce Management (WFM) application, a User Interface of the WFM application, a cloud-based contact center application, and cloud computing, these limitations are not sufficient to qualify as a practical application being recited in the claims along with the abstract ideas since these elements are invoked as tools to apply the instructions of the abstract ideas in a specific technological environment. The mere application of an abstract idea in a particular technological environment and merely limiting the use of an abstract idea to a particular technological field do not integrate an abstract idea into a practical application (MPEP § 2106.05 (f) & (h)).
Evaluated individually, the additional elements do not integrate the identified abstract ideas into a practical application. Evaluating the limitations as an ordered combination adds nothing that is not already present when looking at the elements taken individually.
The claims do not amount to a “practical application” of the abstract idea because they neither (1) recite any improvements to another technology or technical field; (2) recite any improvements to the functioning of the computer itself; (3) apply the judicial exception with, or by use of, a particular machine; (4) effect a transformation or reduction of a particular article to a different state or thing; (5) provide other meaningful limitations beyond generally linking the use of the judicial exception to a particular technological environment.
Accordingly, claims 1-4, 6 are directed to abstract ideas.
Step 2B
Claims 1-4, 6 do not include additional elements that are sufficient to amount to significantly more than the judicial exception because the additional elements when considered both individually and as an ordered combination, do not amount to significantly more than the abstract idea.
The analysis above describes how the claims recite the additional elements beyond those identified above as being directed to an abstract idea, as well as why identified judicial exception(s) are not integrated into a practical application. These findings are hereby incorporated into the analysis of the additional elements when considered both individually and in combination.
For the reasons provided in the analysis in Step 2A, Prong 1, evaluated individually, the additional elements do not amount to significantly more than a judicial exception. Thus, taken alone, the additional elements do not amount to significantly more than a judicial exception.
Evaluating the claim limitations as an ordered combination adds nothing that is not already present when looking at the elements taken individually. In addition to the factors discussed regarding Step 2A, prong two, there is no indication that the combination of elements improves the functioning of a computer or improves any other technology. Their collective functions merely amount to instructions to implement the identified abstract ideas on a computer.
Therefore, since there are no limitations in the claims 1-4, 6 that transform the exception into a patent eligible application such that the claims amount to significantly more than the exception itself, the claims are directed to non-statutory subject matter and are rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 101.
Conclusion
THIS ACTION IS MADE FINAL. 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.
Claims 1-4, 6 were previously not rejected under 35 U.S.C. § 103.
The prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to
applicant's disclosure or directed to the state of the art is listed on the enclosed PTO-892.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MICHAEL BOROWSKI whose telephone number is (703)756-1822, and email is michael.borowski@uspto.gov. The examiner can normally be reached M-F 8-4:30.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Jerry O’Connor can be reached on (571) 272-6787. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571) 273-8300.
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/MB/
Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3624
/MEHMET YESILDAG/Primary Examiner, Art Unit 3624
