Patent Grant
10332201
Financial services entities often offer various types of accounts to their customers. For example, checking, savings, investment and other accounts are often offered. Also, variations of such offered. Also, variations of such accounts may be offered by a financial services entity. For example, checking accounts may be offered that are interest bearing or non-interest bearing, include or exclude certain fees (e.g., fees for check usage, ATM usage, etc.), have varying interest rate structures, etc. In order for a customer to take advantage of multiple accounts, the customer has to open each account and manage each account, either online, at automated teller machines (ATMs), in person, etc., separately. Thus, for example, when the customer wants to transfer funds between accounts using an online banking interface, the customer has to select accounts as the source and destination accounts for the transferred funds in order to initiate the transfer. Also, when a customer establishes multiple accounts, decisions have to be made as to which account, for example, should provide overdraft protection and whether there should be secondary overdraft protection from a third account.
Thus, there is a need for multiple financial accounts that are seamlessly linked and appear as a unitary or near unitary account to the customer of a financial services entity.
In one general aspect, embodiments of the present invention are directed to multiple financial accounts that are unified, or bundled, to appear as a single account from the perspective of a customer of the financial institution that administers the accounts. Embodiments of the present invention are also directed to methods for opening, or creating, such accounts.
In various embodiments, the present invention allows for financial accounts to be arrayed so that transactions relating to the accounts may be managed using a comprehensive transaction management system. Embodiments also allow for cross-account transaction integration of the accounts that is useful over multiple time horizons (i.e., short, medium and long term). In one embodiment, three accounts are seamlessly bundled—a spend account for daily transactions, a reserve account for short term savings and overdraft protection for the spend account, and a growth account for long term savings.
In various embodiments, the present invention is directed to a computer-assisted method of presenting a plurality of financial accounts as a unitary financial account. The method includes displaying, on a graphical display, a graphical representation of a first financial account and displaying, on the graphical display, a graphical representation of a second financial account, wherein the graphical representation of the first financial account and the graphical representation of the second financial account are displayed as a unitary graphical representation that conveys to a user that the first financial account and the second financial account are a partitioned unitary financial account. The method also includes enabling the user to transfer monetary funds between the first financial account and the second financial account by manipulation of the unitary graphical representation.
Those and other details, objects, and advantages of the present invention will become better understood or apparent from the following description and drawings showing embodiments thereof.
Various embodiments of the present invention are described herein by way of example in conjunction with the following figures, wherein:
In general, various embodiments of the present invention are directed to multiple financial accounts that are unified, or bundled, to appear as a single account from the perspective of a customer of the financial institution that administers the accounts. In one embodiment, a non-interest bearing checking account, an interest bearing checking account, and a savings or investment account are presented as a unified account to a customer of the financial institution that administers the accounts.
As shown in
The position of a thumb element 16 may be changed to redistribute funds between the debit and reserve accounts. To a user, redistribution of the funds in such a manner appears seamless because, although the funds are moved between the underlying accounts, the user does not have to explicitly move funds between the accounts. Graphical balance representations 18, 20 illustrate the amount of funds from the debit account that are scheduled out for payment and the amount of funds from the debit account that are free (i.e., have not been allocated to a debit).
In various embodiments, bill payment information may be presented textually. A scheduled-out graphic 22 may represent information regarding bill payments that are scheduled out for payment in the near term (e.g., until the next scheduled payday or within a predetermined time period measured from the current date), and a future scheduled out graphic 24 may present similar information for bill payments that are scheduled out for payment at later dates. A graphic 26 may indicate a portion of the reserve amount that may be allocated toward purchases anticipated in the future. In one embodiment, the portion of the reserve amount that is allocated toward purchases anticipated in the future may include funds from the growth account. In various embodiments, the user may select an item from the graphic 26 for purchase in the near future and the funds allocated to the purchase are transferred from the reserve or growth account to the debit account and the item is removed from the graphic 26. In one embodiment, the funds allocated toward the items listed on the graphic 26 are “locked” prior to the total goal amount actually being saved such that multiple steps need be performed by the user to transfer the funds to the debit account, thus making it more difficult for the user to spend the funds for a purpose other than the goal for which the funds are being saved.
At step 48 the account is funded by, for example, the user specifying an electronic transfer of funds from a financial institution, by the user specifying the details of an electronic check, or in any appropriate manner. At step 50 a confirmation is presented to the user that provides details of the account information. The confirmation may be sent to the user by, for example, email, text message, a displayed web page, etc. At step 52, it is determined whether the customer had selected, at step 40, to open a bundled, or seamless account or to open one or more individual accounts. If the customer had selected to open one or more individual accounts, at step 54 each account is opened by the financial institution and each account is set up (e.g., account number(s) provisioned, overdraft protection specified, checks ordered, etc.) as per the user's instructions. If the customer had selected to open a bundled account, at step 56 multiple accounts are opened by the financial institution and the accounts are set up, including the linking of the accounts to present a seamless account interface to the user. In one embodiment, the customer is issued a debit card and the multiple bundled accounts are linked to the debit card. In such an embodiment, when the customer inserts the debit card into an ATM, a user interface is displayed that shows, for example, debit account, reserve account, and growth account balance and account information.
In the embodiments illustrated in
The online banking application server 114 is in communication with a transfer warehouse 120 (funds transfer engine), an account information database 122, a customer information database 124, a customer preferences/settings database 126, and other online banking databases 128 that store additional settings and configurations.
Embodiments of the present invention have the advantage that a new type of account does not need to be opened and maintained, but rather conventional accounts may be bundled into a unique arrangement and presented to customers in a seamless manner. Also, embodiments of the present invention have the advantage that growth (savings) account functionality and debit capability are offered using an apparent unitary account without being hampered by government regulations relating to the number of withdrawals permitted from a savings account.
Various embodiments of the present invention may be implemented on computer-readable media. The terms “computer-readable medium” and “computer-readable media” in the plural as used herein may include, for example, magnetic and optical memory devices such as diskettes, compact discs of both read-only and writeable varieties, optical disk drives, hard disk drives, etc. A computer-readable medium may also include memory storage that can be physical, virtual, permanent, temporary, semi-permanent and/or semi-temporary. A computer-readable medium may further include one or more data signals transmitted on one or more carrier waves.
While several embodiments of the invention have been described, it should be apparent that various modifications, alterations and adaptations to those embodiments may occur to persons skilled in the art with the attainment of some or all of the advantages of the present invention. It is therefore intended to cover all such modifications, alterations and adaptations without departing from the scope and spirit of the present invention.
The present application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application No. 61/074,772 filed Jun. 23, 2008.
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