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 .
Status of Claims
This Office action is in reply to filing by applicant on 07/25/2025.
Claims 1 – 20 are currently pending and have been examined.
This action is made non-final.
Double Patenting
Claims 1 – 20 in this application are rejected on the ground of nonstatutory double patenting as being unpatentable over independent method claim 1, independent method claim 5, and independent system claim 16 of the issued parent patent (US12400202B2) to Gonzales et al (the “202 patent, henceforth).
The nonstatutory double patenting rejection is based on a judicially created doctrine grounded in public policy (a policy reflected in the statute) so as to prevent the unjustified or improper timewise extension of the “right to exclude” granted by a patent and to prevent possible harassment by multiple assignees. A nonstatutory double patenting rejection is appropriate where the conflicting claims are not identical, but at least one examined application claim is not patentably distinct from the reference claim(s) because the examined application claim is either anticipated by, or would have been obvious over, the reference claim(s). See, e.g., In re Berg, 140 F.3d 1428, 46 USPQ2d 1226 (Fed. Cir. 1998); In re Goodman, 11 F.3d 1046, 29 USPQ2d 2010 (Fed. Cir. 1993); In re Longi, 759 F.2d 887, 225 USPQ 645 (Fed. Cir. 1985); In re Van Ornum, 686 F.2d 937, 214 USPQ 761 (CCPA 1982); In re Vogel, 422 F.2d 438, 164 USPQ 619 (CCPA 1970); In re Thorington, 418 F.2d 528, 163 USPQ 644 (CCPA 1969).
A timely filed terminal disclaimer in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(c) or 1.321(d) may be used to overcome an actual or provisional rejection based on nonstatutory double patenting provided the reference application or patent either is shown to be commonly owned with the examined application, or claims an invention made as a result of activities undertaken within the scope of a joint research agreement. See MPEP § 717.02 for applications subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA as explained in MPEP § 2159. See MPEP § 2146 et seq. for applications not subject to examination under the first inventor to file provisions of the AIA . A terminal disclaimer must be signed in compliance with 37 CFR 1.321(b).
The filing of a terminal disclaimer by itself is not a complete reply to a nonstatutory double patenting (NSDP) rejection. A complete reply requires that the terminal disclaimer be accompanied by a reply requesting reconsideration of the prior Office action. Even where the NSDP rejection is provisional the reply must be complete. See MPEP § 804, subsection I.B.1. For a reply to a non-final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.111(a). For a reply to final Office action, see 37 CFR 1.113(c). A request for reconsideration while not provided for in 37 CFR 1.113(c) may be filed after final for consideration. See MPEP §§ 706.07(e) and 714.13.
The USPTO Internet website contains terminal disclaimer forms which may be used. Please visit www.uspto.gov/patent/patents-forms. The actual filing date of the application in which the form is filed determines what form (e.g., PTO/SB/25, PTO/SB/26, PTO/AIA /25, or PTO/AIA /26) should be used. A web-based eTerminal Disclaimer may be filled out completely online using web-screens. An eTerminal Disclaimer that meets all requirements is auto-processed and approved immediately upon submission. For more information about eTerminal Disclaimers, refer to www.uspto.gov/patents/apply/applying-online/eterminal-disclaimer.
Although the instant claims 1 - 20 are not identical to the above noted claims of the ‘202 patent, they are not patentably distinct, as more specifically noted immediately below.
Obviousness analysis
Regarding independent method claim 1, independent method claim 4, and independent system claim 20 of the instant claims under examination, these several independent claims (and all of their dependent claims 2, 3, and 5 – 19, via dependency), are all obvious in light of independent method claim 1, independent method claim 5, and independent system claim 16 of the ‘202 Patent.
Namely, the above noted independent claims of the granted parent patent (‘202 patent) recite each and every limitation of the instant independent claims herein, save the instant application’s additional independent claims’ limitation of “anonymizing data”, which additional claim limitation (in the three independent claims 1, 4, and 20 herein) is obvious in light of the parent’s claims. Namely, said parent’s Disclosure itself indicates that it is obvious to additionally “anonymize” the data found in the child’s independent claims. To wit, “The data can be anonymized by stripping customer identifiers, such as names, phone numbers, member numbers, addresses, from the data, or by generating new customer identifiers (e.g., unique strings of alphanumeric characters) that cannot be traced to the original customer identifiers.”. See Specification of the parent ‘202 patent at [039]. That said, the anonymizing of data in the instant claims is obvious.
Claim Rejections – 35 USC 103
In the event the determination of the status of the application as subject to AIA 35 USC 102 and 103 is incorrect, any correction of the statutory basis 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 USC 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 set forth in Graham v. John Deere Co., 383 U.S. 1, 148 USPQ 459 (1966), that are applied for establishing a background for determining obviousness under 35 USC 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 nonobviousness.
Claims 1 – 18 and 20 are rejected pursuant to 35 USC 103 as being unpatentable over Radu (US20150287031A1) in view of Zhang (US20150170175A1) and in further view of Singhal (US20110153440A1).
Regarding claims 1, 4 and 20
A method of paired device interoperation and anonymized analytics, the method comprising:
Radu discloses:
facilitating a plurality of transactions using a point of sale (POS) terminal paired with a reader device, (“A merchant token for use in such a merchant POS client is described, as is a suitable reader device, and a method of conducting a transaction using such a payment system.), [Abstract, published Oct. 8, 2015]) and (“The POS is a computational device adapted to process information and to communicate with the merchant's bank or PSP, and it also contains a credit card reader and a user interface. The credit card reader will typically be adapted to read an EMV chip in a credit card, and to implement the EMV workflows.”, [003]) and (“The merchant POS client comprises a reading device for reading a customer user token and for accepting transaction details and customer verification data, and also a computing device with access to a communications network and in communication with the reading device.”, [Abstract, published Oct. 8, 2015]);
wherein at least a subset of the plurality of transactions are facilitated using payment instrument information read from one or more payment instruments using the reader device; (“Preferably, the customer user token is a credit card or a debit card and wherein the reading device comprises a card reader—the card reader may for example comprise a chip card reader adapted to read an EMV chip. Embodiments of the disclosure are however adapted for use with cards which have only a magnetic stripe.”, [011]);
Radu does not expressly disclose, but Zhang teaches:
processing and anonymizing transaction data associated with the plurality of transactions to generate anonymized analytics data associated with the plurality of transactions, (“The step of analyzing may comprise anonymizing the transaction data.”, [020]) (“correlating the identified demographic characteristics with the identified purchasing behaviors to identify purchasing behaviors of the members of the group, defining criteria to identify a member of the group via a purchasing behavior of the member, gathering transaction data from a financial account of a user at a financial institution for processing transactions of the user with a plurality of merchants and providers,”, [049]);
wherein the anonymized analytics data identifies at least one pattern associated with the plurality of transactions, and (“The step of analyzing may comprise anonymizing the transaction data.”, [020]) and (“A system and method for providing a savings opportunity matched to a spend pattern in association with a financial account includes gathering transaction data from a user's financial account and analyzing the transaction data for a spend pattern.”, [043]), a pattern is identified, as is the anonymizing of transaction data;
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
The combination of Radu and Zhang do not expressly disclose, but Singhal teaches:
wherein the payment instrument information is omitted from the anonymized analytics data; and (“A secure payment system between a customer and a merchant, where the sales terminal wirelessly transmits a partial payment authorization transaction record including, at least a merchant terminal identification and a payment amount, but not a customer bankcard data,”, [Abstract, published June 23, 2011]), the payment instrument data is omitted from the anonymized data;
outputting the anonymized analytics data. (“Alternatively, the sales terminal displays a partial payment authorization transaction record including, at least a merchant terminal identification and a payment amount, but not a customer bankcard data, for a specific sales transaction, for the displayed record to be captured by a wireless device of the customer.”, [Abstract]), the anonymized data is output.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Singhal because Radu would be more efficient, safe, and private should it not disclose to merchants’ (who are being paid by a customer instrument) the customer’s private bank info, as done in Singhal ("The present invention is directed to facilitating private and secure merchant payment at a merchant sales terminal without disclosing customer bankcard data to the merchant.”, Singhal at [002]).
Regarding claims 2 and 5:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claims 1 and 4, respectively:
Zhang further teaches
wherein the at least one pattern includes at least one of a slow purchasing time associated with less than a threshold number of purchases, a peak purchasing time associated with greater than the threshold number of purchases, a proportion of customers making a specific purchase, or a proportion of persons in a store area that make a purchase. (“Tracking the purchasing behavior of the two or more groups, including those who received an offer and those who received alternate offers and no offers, allows the system to calculate and compare data, such as average total spend by group, average ticket size, and user spending below an offer dollar threshold for the different cohorts or groups.”, [0241]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 3:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 1:
Zhang further teaches:
wherein processing and anonymizing the transaction data includes at least one of hashing the payment instrument information, tokenizing the payment instrument information, encrypting the payment instrument information, or stripping out the payment instrument information, wherein the transaction data includes the payment instrument information. (“The step of analyzing may comprise anonymizing the transaction data.”, [020]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 5:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Zhang further teaches:
wherein the at least one pattern includes at least one of a slow purchasing time associated with less than a threshold number of purchases or a peak purchasing time associated with greater than the threshold number of purchases. (“If the percent match exceeds the threshold, the merchant is given the unique merchant ID 2802B associated with the node. If the percent match falls below the threshold a variety of actions may occur including the creation of a new merchant unique ID 2802B and entry into the merchant database, the assignment of the transaction to a “miscellaneous” merchant, and the like.”, [0209]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 6:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Zhang further teaches:
wherein the at least one pattern includes at least one of a proportion of customers making a specific purchase or a proportion of persons in a store area that make a purchase. (“Personalized discounts, or purchase rewards at merchants that cardholders like to shop at, can be created based on the specific profile of a user, such as based on past transaction history and in particular from conclusions drawn about that customer from that transaction history.”, [0285]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 7:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Zhang further teaches:
wherein the at least one device includes a first device that is paired with a second device. (“The server may include one or more of memories, processors, computer readable media, storage media, ports (physical and virtual), communication devices, and interfaces capable of accessing other servers, clients, machines, and devices through a wired or a wireless medium, and the like.”, [0360]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 8:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Radu further teaches:
wherein the at least one device includes a reader device that reads payment instrument information from one or more payment instruments, and wherein facilitating the plurality of transactions using the at least one device includes facilitating the plurality of transactions using the payment instrument information. (“Preferably, the customer user token is a credit card or a debit card and wherein the reading device comprises a card reader—the card reader may for example comprise a chip card reader adapted to read an EMV chip. Embodiments of the disclosure are however adapted for use with cards which have only a magnetic stripe.”, [011]);
Regarding claim 9:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 8:
Singhal further teaches:
wherein the anonymized analytics data does not include the payment instrument information. (“A secure payment system between a customer and a merchant, where the sales terminal wirelessly transmits a partial payment authorization transaction record including, at least a merchant terminal identification and a payment amount, but not a customer bankcard data,”, [Abstract, published June 23, 2011]), the payment instrument data is omitted from the anonymized data.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Singhal because Radu would be more efficient, safe, and private should it not disclose to merchants’ (who are being paid by a customer instrument) the customer’s private bank info, as done in Singhal ("The present invention is directed to facilitating private and secure merchant payment at a merchant sales terminal without disclosing customer bankcard data to the merchant.”, Singhal at [002]).
Regarding claim 10:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Zhang further teaches:
wherein processing and anonymizing the transaction data to generate the anonymized analytics data includes: anonymizing the transaction data to generate anonymized transaction data; and processing the anonymized transaction data to generate the anonymized analytics data. (“The step of analyzing may comprise anonymizing the transaction data.”, [020]) (“correlating the identified demographic characteristics with the identified purchasing behaviors to identify purchasing behaviors of the members of the group, defining criteria to identify a member of the group via a purchasing behavior of the member, gathering transaction data from a financial account of a user at a financial institution for processing transactions of the user with a plurality of merchants and providers,”, [049]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 11:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Zhang further teaches:
wherein processing and anonymizing the transaction data to generate the anonymized analytics data includes: processing the transaction data to generate analytics data; and anonymizing the analytics data to generate the anonymized analytics data. (“The step of analyzing may comprise anonymizing the transaction data.”, [020]) (“correlating the identified demographic characteristics with the identified purchasing behaviors to identify purchasing behaviors of the members of the group, defining criteria to identify a member of the group via a purchasing behavior of the member, gathering transaction data from a financial account of a user at a financial institution for processing transactions of the user with a plurality of merchants and providers,”, [049]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 12:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Zhang further teaches:
wherein processing and anonymizing the transaction data includes hashing sensitive information, wherein the transaction data includes the sensitive information. (“While associating a unique merchant ID 2804C with a merchant name and its variants might be done with a large look-up table, pattern matching techniques and the like there are other data processing techniques including hash-tags, radix indices, and the like to reduce the processing time required.”, [0208]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 13:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Zhang further teaches:
wherein processing and anonymizing the transaction data includes tokenizing sensitive information, wherein the transaction data includes the sensitive information. (“Further, the description splitter may include a merchant tokenize that may generate a sequence of tokens that may relate to a merchant.”, [0206]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 14:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Zhang further teaches:
wherein processing and anonymizing the transaction data includes encrypting sensitive information, wherein the transaction data includes the sensitive information. (“The step of analyzing may comprise anonymizing the transaction data.”, [020]) (“correlating the identified demographic characteristics with the identified purchasing behaviors to identify purchasing behaviors of the members of the group, defining criteria to identify a member of the group via a purchasing behavior of the member, gathering transaction data from a financial account of a user at a financial institution for processing transactions of the user with a plurality of merchants and providers,”, [049]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Zhang because Radu would be more efficient and versatile should it analyze customers’ spending patterns, to better anticipate their needs and to make recommendations as such, as done in Zhang ("The reporting tab may also include purchase insights, or spend pattern metrics, which may be useful for providing recommendations based on a cardholder's transactions and social benchmarking of their spend.”, see Zhang at [0238]).
Regarding claim 15:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Singhal further teaches:
wherein processing and anonymizing the transaction data includes stripping out sensitive information, wherein the transaction data includes the sensitive information. (“A secure payment system between a customer and a merchant, where the sales terminal wirelessly transmits a partial payment authorization transaction record including, at least a merchant terminal identification and a payment amount, but not a customer bankcard data,”, [Abstract, published June 23, 2011]), the payment instrument data is omitted from the anonymized data.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Singhal because Radu would be more efficient, safe, and private should it not disclose to merchants’ (who are being paid by a customer instrument) the customer’s private bank info, as done in Singhal ("The present invention is directed to facilitating private and secure merchant payment at a merchant sales terminal without disclosing customer bankcard data to the merchant.”, Singhal at [002]).
Regarding claim 16:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Singhal further teaches:
wherein outputting the anonymized analytics data includes transmitting the anonymized analytics data to a recipient device. (“A secure payment system between a customer and a merchant, where the sales terminal wirelessly transmits a partial payment authorization transaction record including, at least a merchant terminal identification and a payment amount, but not a customer bankcard data, for a specific sales transaction, to a wireless device of the customer. Alternatively, the sales terminal displays a partial payment authorization “, [Abstract]).
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Singhal because Radu would be more efficient, safe, and private should it not disclose to merchants’ (who are being paid by a customer instrument) the customer’s private bank info, as done in Singhal ("The present invention is directed to facilitating private and secure merchant payment at a merchant sales terminal without disclosing customer bankcard data to the merchant.”, Singhal at [002]).
Regarding claim 17:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Singhal further teaches:
wherein outputting the anonymized analytics data includes automatically performing an action based on the anonymized analytics data. (“Alternatively, the sales terminal displays a partial payment authorization transaction record including, at least a merchant terminal identification and a payment amount, but not a customer bankcard data, for a specific sales transaction, for the displayed record to be captured by a wireless device of the customer.”, [Abstract]), the anonymized data is output.
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Singhal because Radu would be more efficient, safe, and private should it not disclose to merchants’ (who are being paid by a customer instrument) the customer’s private bank info, as done in Singhal ("The present invention is directed to facilitating private and secure merchant payment at a merchant sales terminal without disclosing customer bankcard data to the merchant.”, Singhal at [002]).
Regarding claim 18:
The combination of Radu, Zhang, and Singhal disclose the limitations of claim 4:
Singhal further teaches:
wherein outputting the anonymized analytics data includes displaying the anonymized analytics data using a display. (“Alternatively, the sales terminal displays a partial payment authorization transaction record including, at least a merchant terminal identification and a payment amount, but not a customer bankcard data, for a specific sales transaction, for the displayed record to be captured by a wireless device of the customer.”, [Abstract, Singhal].
It would have been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art before the effective filing date of this application to have modified Radu to incorporate the teachings of Singhal because Radu would be more efficient, safe, and private should it not disclose to merchants’ (who are being paid by a customer instrument) the customer’s private bank info, as done in Singhal ("The present invention is directed to facilitating private and secure merchant payment at a merchant sales terminal without disclosing customer bankcard data to the merchant.”, Singhal at [002]).
Allowable Subject Matter
Claim 19 would be allowable if rewritten or amended in independent claim form. The following is a statement of reasons for the indication of allowable subject matter: Independently, while the claims' limitations most recently set forth herein may individually be disclosed by the prior art, the claims as a whole are not obvious because the examiner would have to improperly use their separate limitations as a road map to combine them.
CONCLUSION
The following prior art made of record and not relied upon is considered pertinent to applicant's disclosure. Please see attached form 892.
Laracey (US20130246203A1) – Systems, methods and apparatus for conducting payment transactions are provided. Pursuant to some embodiments, the payment transactions may be conducted between a consumer operating a mobile device and a merchant.
McClung (US20160162882A1) – Methods and systems for facilitating a choice by a consumer of one of a plurality of eWallets from an eWallet entity or from an eWallet provider and/or choice of a particular digital money from a plurality of virtual currency providers, with or without choice of taxing or fee country or jurisdiction for doing the transaction, with or without choice of a shipment entity for the shipment of good(s); and, in certain aspects, each eWallet provider and/or digital money provider able to access a master account of a consumer and/or digital money account(s) of the consumer; and in certain such methods, multiple entities bidding regarding price and/or incentive(s) in order to influence the consumer to choose a particular eWallet and/or a particular digital money to effect a transaction, e.g., a sales or rental transaction or a transaction for services; and such methods in which a consumer's multi-card is used.
Any inquiry concerning this communication or earlier communications from the examiner should be directed to MATTHEW COBB whose telephone number is (571) 272-3850. The examiner can normally be reached 9 - 5, M - F.
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If attempts to reach the examiner by telephone are unsuccessful, the examiner’s supervisor, Peter Nolan, can be reached at (571) 270-7016. The fax phone number for the organization where this application or proceeding is assigned is (571) 273-8300.
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/MATTHEW COBB/Examiner, Art Unit 3661
/PETER D NOLAN/Supervisory Patent Examiner, Art Unit 3661
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