In general, embodiments of the invention relate to methods, systems, apparatus and computer program products for managing the recovery of payment from financial institution account(s) in arrears and, more particularly, for determining, in instances in which a customer has multiple financial accounts in arrears, the hierarchy for attempting to recover payment from the accounts and, specifically, which financial account is most important to the financial institution and, thus, should be targeted for payment first.
Financial institutions and other entities that extend credit to customers are constantly task with trying to recover payment from customers who have allowed their accounts to go past due (i.e., in arrears). Typically, such attempts at payment recovery involve contacting the customer, such as by telephone call or another form of communication, to make the customer aware that their payment on an account has gone into arrears and to encourage or seek payment on the account.
In the financial institution environment, a customer may routinely hold more than one account that requires payment, for example, a mortgage, a personal loan, a car loan, credit card(s) and the like. In such instances, if a customer is experiencing difficulty in making timely payments to one of the accounts it is likely that they may also be experiencing difficulty making payment on other, if not all, accounts. Traditionally, in large enterprise financial institutions in which products, such as mortgages, loans and credit cards and the like, are compartmentalized by business lines/units, each business line/unit, having their own systems of record and recovery processes, would be responsible for recovering payment on accounts in arrears. From a customer perspective, if the customer is in arrears on more than one account held at the financial institution, the customer can expect to be contacted individually by each business line/unit seeking payment recovery.
From the financial institution perspective, having such numerous diverse systems for payment recovery is not only inefficient, it does not provide for the financial institution to prioritize accounts for payment recovery based on which account is most important to the financial institution in terms of payment. For example, if a credit card representative contacts a customer seeking payment on a credit card account in arrears, the customer may be able to satisfy the payment on the credit card account. However, if the customer is subsequently contacted by a mortgage representative seeking payment on a mortgage in arrears, the customer may not be able to make payment on the mortgage because all available funds were exhausted in making payment on the credit card account. Since the mortgage payment is typically deemed more important to the financial institution, the financial institution would have benefitted from the customer making payment on the mortgage account, first, prior to making payment on the credit card account.
Therefore, a need exists for a comprehensive financial institution account payment recovery system that provides a financial institution representative, in contact with a customer, immediate insight into most, if not all, accounts and/or products associated with the customer (i.e., held or otherwise responsible for) that are currently in arrears (i.e. have payment outstanding). As such, the desired system provides the representative the ability to notify the customer of most, if not all, accounts in arrears and seek payment on all of the accounts. A specific need exists to be able to determine and identify, within the user interfaces of the payment recovery system, which one of the customer's accounts and/or products is most important to the financial institution from a payment recovery perspective. Such identification of the most important account and/or product, referred to herein as the lead account, provides the financial institution representative insight which account they should seek payment recovery on first, prior to seeking payment on other accounts in arrears.
The following presents a simplified summary of one or more embodiments in order to provide a basic understanding of such embodiments. This summary is not an extensive overview of all contemplated embodiments, and is intended to neither identify key or critical elements of all embodiments, nor delineate the scope of any or all embodiments. Its sole purpose is to present some concepts of one or more embodiments in a simplified form as a prelude to the more detailed description that is presented later.
Embodiments of the present invention relate to systems, apparatus, methods, and computer program products for providing a customer service representative a unified representation of all customer relationships with respect to the entity, such as a financial institution or other entity providing a customer credit. Specifically, the unified representation may include all accounts in arrears desired for recovery. The invention presents an overarching view of all customer relationships to a customer service representative prior to or immediately upon a customer communication. This allows the representative to make decision and take appropriate actions immediately based on the entire relationship with the customer when a customer communication is initiated.
Specific embodiments of the present invention provide for determining the lead account from amongst one or more, typically a plurality of, accounts associated with a customer and currently in arrears. The “lead account” as defined herein is the account to which a customer service representative looks to receive payment from the customer, first, prior to attempting to receive payment for other accounts in arrears associated with the customer. Once the lead has been determined, lead accounts indicators are displayed, in conjunction with information pertaining to the account, within user interfaces of the unified account payment recovery system. The lead account indicators serve to notify the customer service representative that the associated account is the account to which payment recovery is sought, first, prior to seeking payment recovery on other accounts in arrears that are associated with the customer. In this regard, the customer service representative is constantly aware of which account has been deemed “most important” to the payment recovery entity, e.g., financial institution and, thus, should be the focus of initial payment recovery.
An apparatus for determining a lead account for payment recovery and presenting indication of the lead account in a financial institution payment recovery system defines first embodiments of the invention. The apparatus includes a computing platform having a memory and at least one processor in communication with the memory device. The apparatus further includes a payment recovery module stored in the memory and executable by the processor. The a payment recovery module is configured to receive financial institution account attributes related to a plurality of financial institution accounts, determine that one or more of the financial institution accounts are associated with a customer (e.g., an account held by the customer and/or an account to which the customer is designated as a responsible party), and determine, based on the financial account attributes, that one or more of the financial institution accounts associated with the customer are in arrears. The apparatus additionally includes a lead account determining routine that is stored in the memory and executable by the processor. The lead account determining routine is configured to determine, based on application of one or more predetermined rules, the lead account from amongst the one or more financial institution accounts determined to be in arrears. The lead account is defined as an initial account from which the financial institution attempts recovery of payment from the customer, first, prior to attempting recovery of payment from other accounts determined to be associated with the customer. The lead account determining routine is further configured to, in response to determining the lead account, display, within a user interface of the financial institution account payment recovery system, a lead account indicator in conjunction with a display of information associated with the financial institution account determined to be the lead account.
In specific embodiments of the apparatus, the lead account determining routine is further configured to determine the lead account based on application of a predetermined rule that defines a financial institution system-wide hierarchy of financial institution accounts based on payment recovery importance to the financial institution, such that the lead account is the highest in arrears account in the financial institution system-wide hierarchy. In other specific embodiments of the apparatus, the lead account determining routine is further configured to determine the lead account based on application of a predetermined rule that defines a business-line/unit hierarchy of financial institution accounts based on payment recovery importance to a business-line within the financial institution, such that the lead account is a highest in arrears account in the business-line hierarchy.
In other specific embodiments of the apparatus, the lead account determining routine is further configured to determine the lead account based on application of a predetermined rule that provides for prioritizing financial institution accounts based on a current time period of payment delinquency for an account in arrears, such that the lead account is a highest prioritized financial institution account from amongst the one or more of the plurality of financial institution accounts determined to be in arrears.
In still further specific embodiments of the apparatus, the lead account determining routine is further configured to determine the lead account, based on application of a predetermined rule that provides for prioritizing financial institution accounts based, first, on a type of financial institution account and based, secondly, on a current time period of delinquency for predetermined types of financial institution accounts.
In further specific embodiments of the apparatus, the lead account determining routine is further configured to determine, based on application of the one or more predetermined rules, a payment recovery priority from amongst the one or more financial institution accounts determined to be in arrears. The payment account recovery priority defines an account order for the financial institution to attempt recovery of payment from the accounts in arrears. In such embodiments of the apparatus, the lead account determining routine may be further configured to, in response to determining the payment recovery priority, display, within a user interface of the financial institution account payment recovery system, an ordered listing that defines the payment recovery priority of the one or more financial institution accounts determined to be in arrears.
A method for determining and displaying a lead account in a financial institution payment recovery system defines second embodiments of the invention. The method includes receiving, from a plurality of systems of record, financial institution account attributes related to a plurality of financial institution accounts. The method additionally includes determining that one or more of the financial institution accounts are associated with a customer and determining, based on the financial account attributes, that one or more of the financial institution accounts associated with the customer are in arrears. In addition, the method includes determining, by a computing device processor, based on application of one or more predetermined rules, the lead account from amongst the one or more financial institution accounts determined to be in arrears, and, in response to determining the lead account, displaying, within a user interface of the financial institution account payment recovery system, a lead account indicator in conjunction with a display of information associated with the financial institution account determined to be the lead account.
In specific embodiments of the method, the predetermined rules used to determine the lead account define a financial institution system-wide hierarchy of financial institution accounts based on payment recovery importance to the financial institution, as such the lead account is a highest in arrears account in the financial institution system-wide hierarchy. In other related embodiments of the method, the predetermined rules used to determine the lead account define a business-line/unit hierarchy of financial institution accounts based on payment recovery importance to a business-line/unit within the financial institution, such that the lead account is a highest in arrears account in the business-line hierarchy.
In other specific embodiments of the method, the predetermined rules used to determine the lead account provide for prioritizing financial institution accounts based on a current time period of payment delinquency for an account in arrears and, such that the lead account is a highest prioritized financial institution account from amongst the one or more of the plurality of financial institution accounts determined to be in arrears. In related embodiments of the method, the predetermined rules used to determine the lead account provide for prioritizing financial institution accounts based, first, on a type of financial institution account and based, secondly, on a current time period of delinquency for predetermined types of financial institution accounts.
In still further embodiments of the method, determining the lead account further includes determining, based on application of the one or more predetermined rules, a payment recovery priority from amongst the one or more financial institution accounts determined to be in arrears. The payment account recovery priority defines an order for the financial institution to attempt recovery of payment. In such embodiments of the method, displaying the lead account indicator may further include, in response to determining the payment recovery priority, displaying, within a user interface of the financial institution account payment recovery system, a listing of the one or more financial institution accounts determined to be in arrears. The listing is ordered based on the determined payment recovery priority.
A computer program product including a non-transitory computer-readable medium defines third embodiments of the invention. The computer-readable medium includes a first set of codes for causing a computer to receive, from a plurality of systems of record, financial institution account attributes related to a plurality of financial institution accounts and a second set of codes for causing a computer to determine that one or more of the financial institution accounts are associated with a customer. Additionally, the computer-readable medium includes a third set of codes for causing a computer to determine, based on the financial account attributes, that one or more of the financial institution accounts associated with the customer are in arrears and a fourth set of codes for causing a computer to determine, based on application of one or more predetermined rules, the lead account from amongst the one or more financial institution accounts determined to be in arrears. In addition, the computer-readable medium includes a fifth set of codes for causing a computer to, in response to determining the lead account, display, within a user interface of the financial institution account payment recovery system, a lead account indicator in conjunction with a display of information associated with the financial institution account determined to be the lead account.
Thus, embodiments of the present invention, which are described in more detail below, provide for determining a lead account from amongst one or more financial accounts associated with a customer that are currently in arrears. Once the lead account has been determined a lead account indicator is provided within user interfaces of a unified account payment recovery system application in conjunction with information pertaining to the account. In this regard the representative using the application as a tool to assist in contacting, or being contacted by, customers can readily identify which of the accounts in arrears associated with the customer should be the initial account which the representative attempts to recover payment from.
The features, functions, and advantages that have been discussed may be achieved independently in various embodiments of the present invention or may be combined with yet other embodiments, further details of which can be seen with reference to the following description and drawings.
Having thus described embodiments of the invention in general terms, reference will now be made to the accompanying drawings, wherein:
Embodiments of the present invention will now be described more fully hereinafter with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which some, but not all, embodiments of the invention are shown. Indeed, the invention may be embodied in many different forms and should not be construed as limited to the embodiments set forth herein; rather, these embodiments are provided so that this disclosure will satisfy applicable legal requirements. Like numbers refer to elements throughout. Where possible, any terms expressed in the singular form herein are meant to also include the plural form and vice versa, unless explicitly stated otherwise. Also, as used herein, the term “a” and/or “an” shall mean “one or more,” even though the phrase “one or more” is also used herein.
Furthermore, the term “product” or “account” as used herein may include any financial product, service, or the like that may be provided to a customer from an entity that subsequently requires payment. A product may include an account, credit, loans, purchases, agreements, or the like between an entity and a customer. The term “relationship” as used herein may refer to any products, communications, correspondences, information, or the like associated with a customer that may be obtained by an entity while working with a customer. Customer relationship data may include, but is not limited to addresses associated with a customer, customer contact information, customer associate information, customer products, customer products in arrears, or other information associated with the customer's one or more accounts, loans, products, purchases, agreements, or contracts that a customer may have with the entity.
Although some embodiments of the invention herein are generally described as involving a “financial institution,” one of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that other embodiments of the invention may involve other businesses that take the place of or work in conjunction with the financial institution to perform one or more of the processes or steps described herein as being performed by a financial institution. Still in other embodiments of the invention the financial institution described herein may be replaced with other types of businesses that utilized accounts in arrears recovery.
Thus, systems, apparatus, methods and computer program programs are herein described which provide for determining a lead account from amongst one or more financial accounts associated with a customer that are currently in arrears. The lead account, as defined herein is the first account that a representative should look to receive payment for when contacting or being contacting by a customer with accounts in arrears. As previously noted a customer with multiple accounts, such as mortgages, loans, credit cards and the like, that is experiencing difficulty in making timely payments will typically be delinquent in payment on more than one, if not all, accounts. In such instance, it is beneficial to the financial institution or other entity requiring payment to have up-to-date information as to which account is most important to the financial institution in terms of payment recovery.
In the present invention once the lead account has been determined, lead account indicators, such as icons or the like, are displayed within user interfaces of a unified account payment recovery system application in conjunction with other information related to the corresponding account (e.g., account name/number, period of delinquency, amount delinquent, current balance and the like). As such the lead account indicator provides a representative that is implementing the application as a tool to facilitate communication with a customer, such as telephone communication or the like, with knowledge as to which account is the most important in terms of recovery and, as such, requires initial payment recovery prior to payment recovery on other accounts associated with the customer that are currently in arrears.
Referring to
Memory 14 stores payment recovery module 18 that is included within the unified payment recovery system. The payment recovery module 18 is configured to receive financial account attributes 20 from various different systems of record. The financial account attributes 20 may include, but are not limited to, data related to the current payment status of accounts, such as mortgage accounts, loan account, credit card accounts, demand deposit (e.g., checking) accounts and the like. Current payment status data may include, but is not limited to, payment balance outstanding on the account, current payment due, length of delinquency and the like. The unified nature of the payment recovery system of the present invention provides for the system to receive data feeds from most and in many embodiments all, of the systems of records within an enterprise type financial institution. The data feeds can be received on a regularly scheduled on-going basis, such as once every work day or, in other embodiments of the invention, data feeds may be received constantly on a dynamic (i.e., real time or near real time) basis and/or as-needed basis. Such regularly scheduled data feeds and/or dynamic data feeds allow for lead accounts to be determined on a regularly scheduled basis, such as daily, on an as needed basis or dynamically to reflect real-time or near real-time changes to financial account attributes 20 (e.g., payment made by a customer on an account having an immediate real-time effect on the lead account for that customer).
In addition, payment recovery module 18 is configured to receive account relationship data 21 from a relationship file. The account relationship data 21 indicates which accounts are associated with a customer. Associated accounts may include those accounts held by a customer (either individually or joint) as well as those accounts which the customer is responsible for. Examples of accounts that are the responsibility of a customer include, but are not limited to, undersigned accounts, accounts held by a minor who is the responsibility of the customer, business accounts associated with the customer and the like. Based on the account relationship data 21 the payment recovery module 18 is configured to implement the processor 16 to determine or identify which accounts are associated with each customer.
Once the accounts associated with the customer have been determined, the payment recovery module 18 is additionally configured to implement the processor 16 to determine, based on the financial account attributes 20, which, if any, of the financial accounts associated with the customer are currently considered to be a financial account in arrears 24 (i.e., a financial account with a delinquent payment).
The memory 14 of apparatus 10 additionally includes lead account determining routine 26 that is configured to implement the processor 16 to determine, based on one or more predetermined rules 28, the lead account 30 from amongst the one or more financial accounts 24 associated the customer and determined to currently be in arrears. As previously noted the lead account is the account to which payment recovery should be attempted first, prior to attempting payment recovery from other accounts associated with the customer that are currently in arrears. As such, it the account that is deemed to be most important in terms of payment recovery from the financial institution perspective and/or the associated line of business/business unit within the financial institution. It should be noted that if the customer only has one account currently in arrears, that account is the de facto lead account.
In response to determining the lead account 30, the lead account determining routine 26 is configured to implement the processor 16 to display a lead account indicator 36 within one or more user interfaces 34 of the unified payment recovery system application 32. The lead account indicator 36, which may be an icon or other visual indicator, is displayed in conjunction with information associated with account designated as the lead account. The information may include, but is not limited to, account type/name/number, delinquent amount, balance amount, delinquency length/past due date, customer contact information, responsible parties/customer and the like. For an example of such a lead account indicator, see
Referring to
The apparatus 10 includes computing platform 12 that can receive and execute routines and applications. Computing platform 12 includes memory 14, which may comprise volatile and non-volatile memory, such as read-only and/or random-access memory (RAM and ROM), EPROM, EEPROM, flash cards, or any memory common to computer platforms. Further, memory 14 may include one or more flash memory cells, or may be any secondary or tertiary storage device, such as magnetic media, optical media, tape, or soft or hard disk.
Further, computing platform 12 also includes processor 16, which may be an application-specific integrated circuit (“ASIC”), or other chipset, processor, logic circuit, or other data processing device. Processor 16 or other processor such as ASIC may execute an application programming interface (“API”) (not shown in
Processor 14 may include various processing subsystems (not shown in
Computer platform 12 additionally includes communications module 17 embodied in hardware, firmware, software, and combinations thereof, that enables communications among the various components of the apparatus 10, as well as between the other devices in the unified account payment recovery system. Thus, communication module 17 may include the requisite hardware, firmware, software and/or combinations thereof for establishing a network communication connection and initiating communication amongst networked devices.
As previously noted, the memory 16 of computing platform 12 stores payment recovery module 18 that is included within the unified payment recovery system. The payment recovery module 18 is configured to receive financial account attributes 20 from various different systems of record 40. The systems of record may include mortgage account systems of record 42, loan account (e.g., personal/home equity, vehicle, and the like) systems of record 44, credit card (e.g., consumer, business and the like) system of record 46, demand deposit account (e.g., checking account and the like) systems of record and any other system of record 50, which may contain relevant financial account attributes 20. As previously noted, financial account attributes 20 may include, but are not limited to, data related to the current payment status of financial institution accounts, such as payment balance outstanding on the account, current payment due, length of delinquency and the like.
In addition, payment recovery module 18 is configured to receive account relationship data 21 from a financial institution-based relationship file. The account relationship data 21 indicates which accounts are “associated” with a customer. Associated accounts may include those accounts held by a customer (either individually or joint) as well as those accounts which the customer is responsible for. Examples of accounts that are the responsibility of a customer include, but are not limited to, undersigned accounts, accounts held by a minor who is the responsibility of the customer, business accounts associated with the customer and the like. Based on the account relationship data 21 the payment recovery module 18 is configured to implement the processor 16 to determine or identify which accounts are associated with each customer.
Once the accounts associated with the customer have been determined, the payment recovery module 18 is additionally configured to implement the processor 16 to determine, based on the financial account attributes 20, specifically account payment history and payment due date data 54, which, if any, of the financial accounts associated with the customer are currently considered to be a financial account in arrears 24 (i.e., a financial account with a delinquent payment or an overdrawn account, such as a checking account or the like).
The memory 14 of apparatus 10 additionally includes lead account determining routine 26 that is configured to implement the processor 16 to determine, based on application of financial account attributes 20 to one or more predetermined rules 28, the lead account 30 from amongst the one or more financial accounts 24 associated the customer and determined to currently be in arrears. In specific embodiments of the invention the predetermined rules 28 define a financial institution-wide account hierarchy 56, such that the highest listed account in the hierarchy, which the customer holds or is associated with and is currently in arrears, is determined to be the lead account. For example, if the highest listed account in the hierarchy is a first mortgage and the customer holds such an account and that count is currently in arrears, the first mortgage account is determined to be the lead account 30. However, if the customer does not hold a mortgage with the financial institution or the mortgage account is not in arrears, the highest ranked account in the hierarchy which is associated with the customer and is currently in arrears will be determined to be the lead account 30.
In other embodiments of the invention the predetermined rules 28 may define business unit/line-of-business account hierarchy 58. In this regard, a business unit, business line, or line-of business is defined as any subset or division of the financial institution as a whole, such as, for example, a credit card business unit, a mortgage business unit or the like. The business unit/line-of-business account hierarchy may differ from the financial institution-wide account hierarchy 56, such that, in certain instances, the business unit/line-of-business account hierarchy 58 may override or be used in lieu of the financial institution-wide account hierarchy 56 when determining the lead account. For example, if a business-unit/line-of-business is implementing payment recovery campaigns geared toward recovering payment from accounts associated with their business unit/line-of-business, their particular business unit/line-of-business account hierarchy 58 may take preference over the financial institution account hierarchy 56 in determining the lead account 30.
In other embodiments of the invention other predetermined rules 28 related to length of delinquency 60 or account balance 62 (i.e., outstanding mortgage/loan balance) may be used to determine the lead account. For example, if a customer is associated with multiple different credit card accounts and each of the accounts is in arrears and the highest listed account in the hierarchy that a customer is associated with and is currently in arrears is a credit card-type account, the length of the delinquency 60 may be used to determine the lead account, such that the credit card account with the longest length of delinquency is determined to be the lead account 30. In still further embodiments of the invention, if all of the credit cards associated with the customer that are in arrears have the same or a similar length of delinquency (e.g., overdue in the same month), the account balance 62 may be used to determine the lead account, such that the credit card account with the highest balance is determined to be the lead account 30. In still further embodiments of the invention, other predetermined rules 64 may be defined for the purpose of determining the lead account. It should be noted that the other rules 64 may be dynamically defined based on financial institution needs or concerns, current economic indicators or the like. In this regard, the other rules 64 may be permanent rules or temporary rules that are only used for specific period of time.
In still further embodiments of the invention, the lead account determining routine 26 determines, based on application of financial account attributes 20 to predetermined rules 28, an ordered list for payment recovery priority 66 for a plurality of accounts associated with a customer that are currently in arrears 24. In such embodiments, the ordered list may be displayed in user interfaces of the unified recovery system application, such that representatives communicating with a customer know the preferred order of payment recovery for the accounts in arrears.
Referring to
The financial institution network devices 260, which my comprise a plurality of servers and the like, include a processing device 262 that is in communication with a memory 264. The memory stores a plurality of systems of records 40, such as mortgage account systems of record 42, loan account systems of record 44, credit card account systems of record 46. Demand deposit account systems of record 48 and the like. The systems of record 40 provide data feeds to the unified payment recovery system 208 in the form of financial account attributes 20 which are used to determine which accounts are in arrears 24 and which account 30 from amongst the accounts is the lead account for a customer 22. In addition, network devices 260 store in memory 264 an account relationship file 266 that indicates which accounts are associated with which customers. As such, the relationship file 266 is called upon to determine which financial accounts are associated with a given customer.
The unified recovery system 208 which resides in and is executed by one or more network devices 246 includes lead account determining routine 26 which is configured to determine, based on application of financial account attributes 20 to one or more predetermined rules 28, a lead account 30 for payment recovery from amongst the one or more financial accounts determined to be in arrears 24. The lead account 30 defines which account the representative 205 should look to first for payment recovery when the representative is communicated with the customer via the unified payment recovery system application 244. As previous noted the predetermined rules may be based on financial institution-wide (i.e., enterprise-wide) hierarchy, a business unit/line-of-business hierarchy, length of delinquency, account balance, amount overdue or the like.
Additionally, the system 207 includes a communication device 236, such as a personal computer (PC), laptop/portable computer or the like that is operable by financial institution representative 205. The communication device stores, via memory 240 (or has network access to, a unified payment recovery system application 244, which is described in more detail in infra. in the discussion related to FIGS. 7 and 10-14. The unified payment recovery system application, which is executable by processing device 238, provides the representative 205 with unified views (i.e., user interfaces 34) of accounts in arrears and, specifically a unified view of all the accounts in arrears associated (i.e., held or the responsibility of) with a customer. In this regard, the representative, in contact with the customer typically via telephonic communication, has a comprehensive view of all accounts currently requiring payment recovery and, as such, can address all such accounts with the customer during a single communication (e.g. a single telephone call) and manage/strategize payment recovery on such accounts. In accordance with embodiments of the present invention, in response to determining the lead account, the unified payment recovery system application 244 is configured to display, within user interfaces 34, a lead account indicator 36 in conjunction with display of information 38 associated with the account determined to be the lead account 30. The lead account indicator 36 serves to notify the representative 205 that this particular account is the account that the representative should attempt to recover payment from, first, prior to attempting to recover payment from other accounts associated with the customer that are also currently in arrears 24. As noted previously, if the customer currently has only one account in arrears 24 that account will be designated as the lead account 30 and the lead account indicator 36 will be displayed in conjunction with information 38 pertaining to that account. The information 38 associated with the account may include, but is not limited to, account type, account number, current balance, current delinquent amount, length of delinquency/due date, customer(s) associated with account, contact information, contact/communication history, payment history and the like.
At Event 74, a determination is made that one or more financial accounts are associated with the customer. As previously noted, “associated” accounts include accounts held by the customer as well as accounts that are deemed to be the responsibility of the customer, such as the customer undersigning an account, a customer being legally responsible for an account or the like. In this regard, data feeds from an account relationship file may be received on an on-going scheduled basis or an as-needed on-demand basis as a means of determining which accounts are associated with a given customer.
At Event 76, the financial account attributes are used to make a determination that one or more of the accounts associated with the customer are in arrears (i.e., a payment outstanding that is delinquent). As previously noted, based on the data feeds from the systems of record typically occurring on an on-going scheduled basis, such as once every business day, the determination of accounts in arrears may occur on the same on-going scheduled basis, such as once every business day. It should be noted that if only one account associated with the customer is determined to be in arrears that account is the de facto lead account for the customer.
At Event 78 the lead account is determined from the amongst the accounts determined to be arrears based on application of the financial account attributes to one or more predetermined rules. The predetermined rules may define a financial institution account hierarchy for payment recovery priority. In such instances, the highest listed account within the hierarchy that is associated with the customer and in arrears is determined to be the lead account. In other embodiments the predetermined rules may define a business unit/line-of-business account hierarchy for payment recovery priority. In such instances, the business unit/line-of-business account hierarchy may, in certain implementations, override or take preference over an existing financial institution account hierarchy. Additional predetermined rules may be based on length of delinquency, account balance and/or the amount overdue. For example, an account having a longer delinquency period, a higher account balance or a higher overdue amount may take preference in a hierarchical listing of accounts when the accounts are of a same type (e.g., various different credit card accounts are currently in arrears). In other embodiments in which a hierarchy is not used to determine the lead account, rules related to length of delinquency, account balance and/or the amount overdue may be used alone or in combination as the basis for determining the lead account.
It should be noted that the lead account may be determined prior to organizing accounts into queues or, in other embodiments, after organizing accounts into queues. Queues as used herein are groups of accounts provided to representatives for the purpose of having the representative contact the customer regarding the account in arrears. In specific embodiments in which lead accounts are determined prior to organizing accounts in queues, queues may be organized based on lead accounts, such that representatives contact the customer concerning the lead account delinquency, initially attempt to recover payment on the lead account and, if successful, attempt payment recovery on other non-lead accounts associated with the customer that are currently in arrears.
At Event 80, in response to determining the lead account, a lead account indicator is displayed within user interfaces of a unified payment recovery system application. The lead account indicator is displayed in conjunction with a display of information associated with the account determined to be the lead account. The information may include, but is not limited to, the customer associated with the account, customer contact information, delinquent amount, the period of delinquency, account balance, account type, and the like. In addition to providing for display of the lead account indicator, the user interfaces may include an ordered listing of the other accounts associated with the customer that are currently in arrears. The ordered listing is ordered based on their priority for payment recover as determined by predetermined rules.
The next step in the process 100, as illustrated in block 106, is to identify payments in arrears associated with the customer. As such, the products or accounts that have payments in arrears that are associated with that particular customer are identified. A product or account with a payment in arrears may be qualified as being in arrears based on the entity itself and/or agreements for payment between the customer and the entity. For example, after the due date for payment for the product or after a predetermined number of days after the due date, the product may be considered by the entity to be in arrears. Furthermore, the accounts or products with payments in arrears for people affiliated with that customer, such as when the customer is a guarantor for the associate or the like, may also be identified by the system. People affiliated with the customer may include friends, family, or the like associated with the customer.
As illustrated in block 108, the system determines the priority of the products with payments in arrears. In this way, the system may determine which products in arrears should take priority over the other products for purposes of recovery of payments. The primary account for recover is the account or product that the entity has identified as having payment in arrears that is the one which needs to be recovered first. This may be based on entity determination, interest rate, amount, importance, or the like. As such, the system may identify the products with payments in arrears that are the most important to recover first ahead of the other payment products. Thus, the representative may focus on recovering payments for that identified product. Finally, as illustrated in block 110, the process 100 continues by providing access to a unified application to a representative for customer communications. The unified application provides the representative with an across the entity view of the customer's relationship with the entity as well as information associated with the primary account and other accounts with payments in arrears. Finally, the unified application also provides information associated with prior customer communications. As such, the invention provides a holistic customer service experience for a customer with accounts in arrears.
Next, as illustrated in block 304, the system may determine regulations and internal restrictions associated with individual customer communications. Regulations may include laws or other regulations regarding the time of day a customer may be contacted, the amount of times within a given day/week/month that a customer may be contacted, a telephone number in which a customer may be contacted, or the like. As such, the system ensures that the representative is following all regulations and/or laws regarding the contacting of customers with products having payments in arrears. Internal regulations may include any rule that an entity may put in place to restrict or warn a representative prior to the representative contacting a customer or during the representative's communication with the customer. For example, an internal regulation may be set based on a customer communication preference, such as a specific telephone number to utilize for communications with the customer. In another example, the entity may identify an event that requires the entity to delay in communicating with a customer regarding a product with a payment in arrears (e.g., a natural disaster in the geographic are where the customer is located or another known event that may interfere with a customer providing payment).
In some embodiments, the regulations or restrictions may, in some instances, be overridden by the representative. In this way, the representative may still contact the customer even if a regulation or restriction is in place. The representative may need to input a reason for overriding the regulation or restriction. In some embodiments, the regulation or restriction may not be overridden by any representative. In this way, the system will not allow the representative to communicate with the customer at that time. In some embodiments, no regulation or restriction may be placed on a customer communication. As such, the representative may contact the customer at any time.
Next, as illustrated in block 306 the system may utilize the regulations and restrictions to create rules for customer communications. These rules may be created and applied to a customer on a customer-by-customer basis. In this way, each customer, based on the customer's location, telephone number, or the like, may have a unique set of rules applied for him/her based on regulations and/or restrictions that may apply to the customer having payments in arrears for products. Next, once the rules have been created and applied in block 306, the determined rules may be correlated with each individual customer having payments in arrears, as illustrated in block 308.
As illustrated in block 310 of
Next, as illustrated in block 312 the system may allow the representative to initiate a communication with the customer. Allowing the representative to initiate a communication with a customer may be based on the determined regulations and restrictions. In some embodiments, the regulations and restrictions will not allow a representative to communicate with the customer. In some embodiments, the regulations and restrictions will warn against communicating with the customer. However, a representative may be able to override the warning. In some embodiments, the regulations and restrictions will allow a representative to communicate with the customer.
Finally, as illustrated in block 314, the system may track and store details regarding the customer communications. In this way, the system may track the disposition of the communication, such as determining if a communication was answered by the customer, a busy signal was received, or that the customer answered the communication. The system may identify the date, time, means of communication (such as specific telephone number, email address, or the like). Furthermore, the system may store any comments or notes made by the representative during the communications.
The network 201 may be a global area network (GAN), such as the Internet, a wide area network (WAN), a local area network (LAN), or any other type of network or combination of networks. The network 201 may provide for wireline, wireless, or a combination wireline and wireless communication between devices on the network 201.
In some embodiments, the customer 202 is an individual who maintains products with the entity. These products may be one or more contracts, accounts, loans, transactions, agreements, or the like. As such, the customer 202 may have one or more products with payments in arrears. In some embodiments, the customer 202 may be a merchant or a person, employee, agent, independent contractor, and the like acting on behalf of the merchant that may have one or more products with payments in arrears with the entity.
As illustrated in
The processing device 248 is operatively coupled to the communication device 246 and the memory device 250. The processing device 248 uses the communication device 246 to communicate with the network 201 and other devices on the network 201, such as, but not limited to the representative system 206, the customer system 204, and the financial institution network device (or system) 210. As such, the communication device 246 generally comprises a modem, server, or other device for communicating with other devices on the network 201.
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In some embodiments, the data collection application 256 may collect and compile recovery products utilized across the entity into a single centralized unified recovery system 208. These may be collected from entity representative systems 206, the financial institution network device (or system) 210, and/or other systems. These recovery products may be internal or external dockets, ledgers, software, systems, or the like that are designed to initiate, monitor, and record any communication or payment associated with customer 202 product accounts in arrears.
In some embodiments, the data collection application 256 may collect and compile customer relationship data. In this way, the data collection application 256 may compile all information that an entity may have associated with a customer 202. Customer relationship data may include, but is not limited to addresses associated with a customer, customer contact information, customer affiliate information, customer products, customer products in arrears, or other information associated with the customer's one or more accounts, loans, products, purchases, agreements, or contracts that a customer may have with the entity. In some embodiments, the customer relationship associates primary, secondary, and relationship accounts and/or products with various customers to one customer. In this way, some accounts associated with a family member, friend, or that customer may all be associated with that customer. This way, the data collection application 256 compiles this data such that one individual customer may be contacted regarding one or more accounts/products in arrears. Customer affiliates may be one or more of co-signers, named on the account, family member, or the like associated with the account.
In other embodiments, the data collection application 256 may merge the recovery programs and the customer relationship data together into the unified recovery system 208. This data may be stored and grouped by the customer 202, customer identification number, account number, or telephone number. In this way, the system may generate a single centralized location for customer relationships for a representative to view and interact with. As such, any different recovery products and customer relationship data may be integrated into the one centralized unified recovery system.
In the embodiment illustrated in
In some embodiments, the communication application 257 allows for presentment of data to the representative. This data may be customer 202 information, prior communications, communication dispositions, current accounts, accounts in arrears, primary accounts for recovery, and the like. In this way, the representative may have information associated with all customer relationships within the entity easily accessible for his/her communication with the customer 202.
In some embodiments, the communication application 257 allows for incorporation of a rules engine into the information provided to the representative. In some embodiments, the rules associated with the rules engine may be manually input by a representative. In some embodiments, the rules associated with the rules engine may be automatically input. In some embodiments, the rules may be based on entity requirements or preferences. In this way, the rules may be based on segments of the entity, such as lines of business, business units, or the like. In some embodiments, the rules may be based on customer preferences. In yet other embodiments, the rules may be based on legal requirements or restrictions. These rules may be communicated to the representative system 206 for the representative 205 from the communication application 257 via the network 201. In this way, the representative 205 may be aware of the rules for customer 202 communications.
Along with the rules, the communication application 257 may also determine a primary accounts for recovery associated with the customer 202, identify an appropriate representative 206, warn or prohibit communications to a customer 202, or require disposition input after a communication. Determining a primary account for recovery requires the communication application 257 to communicate with the financial institution network device (or system) 210 to select an account in arrears that is the primary account for the entity to focus recovery efforts. This may be determined by entity determined factors, such as interest rates, amounts due for recovery for one or more accounts in arrears, representative determined accounts, mortgage accounts, or the like. Selecting an appropriate representative may be achieved by the communication application 257 based on which representative has experience with that particular customer, knowledge with that particular primary account for recovery, or general expertise regarding a field associated with the primary account for recovery. The communication application 257 may communicate warning or prohibiting communications to a customer 202 via the network 201 to a representative system 206.
In some embodiments, the communication application 257 may allow for communications between a representative 205 of the entity and a customer 202 of the entity via the network 201. In preferred embodiments, the communication between the representative 205 and the customer 202 is typically done through telephone communications, such as telephone calls. Other representative 205 communication with the customer 202 may be via text messaging, email messaging, or other voice communications. In this way, the communication application 257 allows for the communication, limits the communication, and/or doesn't allow any communication based on the rules determined.
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The financial institution network device (or system) 210 is operatively coupled to the unified recovery system 208, the representative system 206, and/or the customer system 204 through the network 201. The financial institution network device (or system) 210 has systems with devices the same or similar to the devices described for the unified recovery system 208 and the representative system 206 (i.e., communication device, processing device, and memory device). Therefore, the financial institution network device (or system) 210 communicate with the unified recovery system 208, the representative system 206, and/or the customer system 204 in the same or similar way as previously described with respect to each system. The financial institution network device (or system) 210, in some embodiments, is comprised of systems and devices that allow the unified recovery system 208, the representative system 206, and the customer system 204 to access one or more accounts associated with the customer 202 of the financial institution.
It is understood that the servers, systems, and devices described herein illustrate one embodiment of the invention. It is further understood that one or more of the servers, systems, and devices can be combined in other embodiments and still function in the same or similar way as the embodiments described herein.
System defined 404 rules for implementation include determining a primary account or product in arrears for recovery 410, identifying an appropriate representative 416, internal communication restrictions 418, and requiring the providing of disposition inputs 420. Each of these system defined 404 rules may be implemented by the entity, one or more lines of business of the entity, or the like. The system defined 404 rules may group the customer accounts with payments in arrears in segments, queues, campaigns, lists, or the like. In this way, the system defined rules 404 may group customer accounts with payments in arrears that are similar to each other, such that they may be grouped together and placed into a single representative's segment, queue, campaign, list, or the like.
Determining the primary account for recover requires the system to determine the priority of the products with payments in arrears that should be collected ahead of other products, such receiving payments on a home loan owned by the customer ahead of payments on a car loan and credit card also associated with customer. In this way, the system may determine which products in arrears require recovery first. This is referred to as the primary account for recovery. The primary account for recovery is the account or product that the entity has identified as having the highest priority for recovery of payments over the other accounts held by the customer. In specific embodiments, the primary account for recovery 410 is based on account level variables 412 and/or internal scoring metrics 414. The account level variables 412 include account information such as interest rate, amount in arrears, or the like. Internal scoring metrics 414 measure the various products provided by an entity to determine which are the most important to recover. These may include various types of loans, lines of credits, or the like. As such, the entity will internally determine the importance of recovering each of these products. As such, the system may identify the account/product with payments in arrears to be recovered first, over all other accounts in arrears (i.e., the product that all recovery efforts must be focused on initially. This account is classified as the primary or lead account in arrears for recovery 410.
In some embodiments, the system defined 404 rules include identifying an appropriate representative 416. Identifying an appropriate representative 416 based on rules requires determining which representative has experience with that particular customer, knowledge with that particular primary account for recovery, or general expertise regarding a field associated with the primary account for recovery.
In some embodiments, the system defined 404 rules include internal communication restrictions 418. These rules may place a restriction or warning on the attempted communication with a customer. The internal communication restrictions 418 may be provided by the system based on various factors associated with that customer or customer location. For example, the system may determine that there has been a natural disaster such as a hurricane, flood, tornado, earthquake or the like near the customer's location. As such, the system may restrict communications with that customer. Internal communication restrictions 418 may also be any other internally documented or noted reason for delaying or restricting the communications with a customer.
In some embodiments, the system defined 404 rules include rules requiring dispositions to be inputted 420. Dispositions may be narratives from the representative 422 or system 424 that detail the customer communications. Representative 422 disposition input may include information about the customer communication, such as if an agreement was reached on payment, updated information about the customer, or information about the discussion between the representative and the customer. System 424 disposition input may include system identified data regarding the customer communication. This may include the time of day for the communication, date of communication, whether the customer answered, whether a third party answered, whether the communication line was busy, whether there was no answer, or the like.
Customer defined 406 rules for implementation include which individual(s) to communicate with 426, an approved communication time 428, an approved means of communicating 430, a language of communication 432, or other 434. In some embodiments, the customer defined 406 rules include individuals to communicate with 426. In this way, a customer may identify a guarantor or individual within the household that may be responsible for the product in arrears. As such, the customer may note which individual to have communications with to discuss payments for the product in arrears.
In some embodiments, customer defined 406 rules include best communication times 428. In this way, the customer may state that the best time to reach or communicate with him/her is a specific time. For example, a customer may request the representative communication at 8:00 pm to discuss the product with payments in arrears. As such, the communication time customer defined 406 rule may be to communicate with the customer at the time the customer has specified.
In some embodiments, the customer defined 406 rules may include restrictions on the means of communication 430. The means of communication 430 may include telephone communications, other voice communications, email communication, text communications, or the like. The customer may recommend that he/she be communicated with strictly by one or more of the communication means. This request will be implemented as a rule for the representative to be made aware of prior to customer communications.
In some embodiments, the customer defined 406 rules may include a language of communication 432. In this way, various languages such as Spanish, French, German, or the like may be spoken with that particular customer. Finally, customer defined 406 rules may change based on the customer. As such, other rules may be added or removed based on customer preference. Thus, providing the customer with a more pleasant communication regarding products with payments in arrears.
Legally-defined 408 rules for implementation include rules based on any laws or regulations that are directed towards a representative communication with a customer regarding payments in arrears for products. These legally defined 408 regulations or restrictions may include laws or other regulations regarding the time zone 436 of the customer. The time zone 436 associated with the customer may be identified based on the area code of the customer's telephone number. In some embodiments, there may be more than one time zone associated with the customer. Each time zone 436 rule will be stored individually per telephone number or communications means. There may be legal restrictions associated with when a customer may be contacted based on the time of day because of a difference in time zones between the customer and the representative.
In some embodiments, the legally defined 408 rules may restrict the communication volume 438, otherwise referred to as communication velocity. The communication volume 438 may be the amount of times the representative may contact the customer within a predetermined time period, such as number of times in a day/week/month. Furthermore the communication volume 438 may include the duration of time that the representative may spend in communication with a customer within a predetermined time period, such a limited amount of time in a 24 hour period.
In some embodiments, the legally defined 408 rules may restrict the time 440 of day the customer may be contacted. For example, a customer may only be contacted between 9:00 am and 6:00 pm during the week and not at all during the weekend. As such, the time 440 restrictions will utilize the time zone of the area code and determine if it is acceptable to communicate with the customer at that time. The system may be configured to forbid calling the customer outside of the acceptable time period.
In some embodiments, the legally-defined 408 rules may include restrictions on the means of communication 442. The means of communication 442 may include telephone communications, other voice communications, email communication, text communications, or the like.
In some embodiments, the rules may, in some instances, be over rode by the representative. In this way, the representative may still contact the customer even if a rule restricting the communication may be in place. The representative may need to input a reason for overriding the rule. In some embodiments, the rule may be permanent or unchangeable, thus a representative may not ever be capable of override the rule. In this way, the system will not allow the representative to communicate with the customer at that time. In some embodiments, no rule may be placed on a customer communication. As such, the representative may contact the customer at any time.
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As illustrated in section 702, the unified application 700 provides the representative with a general toolbar with various capabilities to search within a database, queue, or the like. The searches may be performed based on an account or product number, based on whether the unified application is open with another representative, by cross searching, or the like. As illustrated in section 704 a customer specific toolbar allows a representative to quickly determine the balance remaining on the product, the number of account cycles the product has already been through, and a status of the account. Also the representative may be provided an indication that the account is in arrears, if attempts to recover the account have been implemented, whether the account is a primary account, secondary account, or relationship account. A primary account is the account that is the account that recovery is the primary focus of first recovery. The secondary accounts are one or more accounts or products that the customer may have that also have payments in arrears, but is not the primary payment account for recovery. Relationship accounts are accounts where the customer is a guarantor or the like.
While the toolbars are provided to a representative to allow the representative to quickly discern information, more detail is provided about the customer relationship or account with payment in arrears in the subsequent sections. As illustrated in the customer information section 706A, the customer identification number, customer name, and customer address is presented to the representative. Furthermore, information, such as the last time an address was changed is also within the customer information section 706A. Below the customer information section 706A is the current payment detail section 712 where there is information presented about current payments, past payments, billing cycles, and when payments are due.
As illustrated in section 708, the system provides the representative with indicators, such as if the unified application is locked by another representative, or the like. In this example, the indicator 708 presented indicates to the representative that the alternative phone number should be used in this case. As such, the customer may have provided a customer defined rule to make all communications to an alternative telephone number. Other indicators may include blocks on accounts based on non-secured accounts, lead or primary accounts, and relationship accounts As illustrated in section 710 the communication means are presented. In this case the communication means are telephone numbers. This section allows a representative to select a telephone number to communicate with the representative. This section, along with section 708, is further detailed in
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In certain embodiment, during the process 500, especially after the representative communication with the customer in block 516 or during the input of a disposition in block 518, the system may send the representative an incoming communication from a customer, as illustrated in decision block 520. If there is an incoming communication from a customer queued for the representative, he/she will be presented with the unified application for the customer associated with the incoming communication, as illustrated in block 522. At that point the representative may then be allowed to communicate with the customer, as illustrated in block 516. Finally, if there is no incoming communications in decision block 520, the process reverts back to providing the representative with the representative's queue, as illustrated in block 504.
Thus, the present invention as described in detail above, provides for determining a lead account from amongst one or more financial accounts associated with a customer that are currently in arrears. Once the lead account has been determined a lead account indicator is provided within user interfaces of a unified account payment recovery system application in conjunction with information pertaining to the account. In this regard the representative using the application as a tool to assist in contacting, or being contacted by, customers can readily identify which of the accounts in arrears associated with the customer should be the initial account which the representative attempts to recover payment from.
As will be appreciated by one of ordinary skill in the art, the present invention may be embodied as an apparatus (including, for example, a system, a machine, a device, a computer program product, and/or the like), as a method (including, for example, a business process, a computer-implemented process, and/or the like), or as any combination of the foregoing. Accordingly, embodiments of the present invention may take the form of an entirely software embodiment (including firmware, resident software, micro-code, and the like), an entirely hardware embodiment, or an embodiment combining software and hardware aspects that may generally be referred to herein as a “system.” Furthermore, embodiments of the present invention may take the form of a computer program product that includes a computer-readable storage medium having computer-executable program code portions stored therein. As used herein, a processor may be “configured to” perform a certain function in a variety of ways, including, for example, by having one or more general-purpose circuits perform the functions by executing one or more computer-executable program code portions embodied in a computer-readable medium, and/or having one or more application-specific circuits perform the function.
It will be understood that any suitable computer-readable medium may be utilized. The computer-readable medium may include, but is not limited to, a non-transitory computer-readable medium, such as a tangible electronic, magnetic, optical, infrared, electromagnetic, and/or semiconductor system, apparatus, and/or device. For example, in some embodiments, the non-transitory computer-readable medium includes a tangible medium such as a portable computer diskette, a hard disk, a random access memory (RAM), a read-only memory (ROM), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory), a compact disc read-only memory (CD-ROM), and/or some other tangible optical and/or magnetic storage device. In other embodiments of the present invention, however, the computer-readable medium may be transitory, such as a propagation signal including computer-executable program code portions embodied therein.
It will also be understood that one or more computer-executable program code portions for carrying out operations of the present invention may include object-oriented, scripted, and/or unscripted programming languages, such as, for example, Java, Perl, Smalltalk, C++, SAS, SQL, Python, Objective C, and/or the like. In some embodiments, the one or more computer-executable program code portions for carrying out operations of embodiments of the present invention are written in conventional procedural programming languages, such as the “C” programming languages and/or similar programming languages. The computer program code may alternatively or additionally be written in one or more multi-paradigm programming languages, such as, for example, F#.
It will further be understood that some embodiments of the present invention are described herein with reference to flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams of systems, methods, and/or computer program products. It will be understood that each block included in the flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams, and combinations of blocks included in the flowchart illustrations and/or block diagrams, may be implemented by one or more computer-executable program code portions. These one or more computer-executable program code portions may be provided to a processor of a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, and/or some other programmable data processing apparatus in order to produce a particular machine, such that the one or more computer-executable program code portions, which execute via the processor of the computer and/or other programmable data processing apparatus, create mechanisms for implementing the steps and/or functions represented by the flowchart(s) and/or block diagram block(s).
It will also be understood that the one or more computer-executable program code portions may be stored in a transitory or non-transitory computer-readable medium (e.g., a memory, and the like) that can direct a computer and/or other programmable data processing apparatus to function in a particular manner, such that the computer-executable program code portions stored in the computer-readable medium produce an article of manufacture, including instruction mechanisms which implement the steps and/or functions specified in the flowchart(s) and/or block diagram block(s).
The one or more computer-executable program code portions may also be loaded onto a computer and/or other programmable data processing apparatus to cause a series of operational steps to be performed on the computer and/or other programmable apparatus. In some embodiments, this produces a computer-implemented process such that the one or more computer-executable program code portions which execute on the computer and/or other programmable apparatus provide operational steps to implement the steps specified in the flowchart(s) and/or the functions specified in the block diagram block(s). Alternatively, computer-implemented steps may be combined with operator and/or human-implemented steps in order to carry out an embodiment of the present invention.
While certain exemplary embodiments have been described and shown in the accompanying drawings, it is to be understood that such embodiments are merely illustrative of, and not restrictive on, the broad invention, and that this invention not be limited to the specific constructions and arrangements shown and described, since various other changes, combinations, omissions, modifications and substitutions, in addition to those set forth in the above paragraphs, are possible. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that various adaptations and modifications of the just described embodiments can be configured without departing from the scope and spirit of the invention. Therefore, it is to be understood that, within the scope of the appended claims, the invention may be practiced other than as specifically described herein.