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In recent years, there has been a steady proliferation of loyalty programs offered to consumers. There are a variety of different models on which such loyalty programs are based, but a common feature is that they offer an incentive designed to encourage customers to conduct business with one organization rather than with competitor organizations. Such loyalty systems often take the form of point systems in which a customer is credited with a number of points for each transaction and is entitled to later exchange or redeem accumulated points for goods and/or services.
One longstanding example is the loyalty system used in the airline industry. An airline typically offers a number of points to each consumer that is correlated with the distance traveled. At certain levels, the points may be exchanged by the consumer for airline tickets.
Loyalty systems are also becoming widely used in connection with the retail sale of goods. As an example, a customer using a credit card may be awarded points by the card issuer for all transactions that are conducted using the credit card. In some instances, one point may be awarded for each dollar spent. Additional, special incentives may be awarded for credit card purchases of specific goods or at specific merchants (e.g., double points may be awarded). Such special incentives often require arrangements between the card issuer and the merchant to account for the value to the merchant of points being issued (and, ultimately, the cost to the issuer when the points are redeemed by the consumer). Generally, however, such loyalty systems are limited in flexibility and are narrow in scope.
Thus, there is a general recognition in the industry of a need for more sophisticated loyalty-based systems capable of taking into account the arrangements between the issuer of loyalty points (e.g., a credit card company, bank, airline or other entity) and the merchant that may want to also award points as an incentive to consumers. However, it is sometimes difficult for the issuer and the merchant to establish the value of the points (i.e., the value to the merchant from increased business and the ultimate cost to the issuer when points are redeemed), since such value will depend on how many consumers make purchases in order to take advantage of the program to get points and then how many of those consumers actually redeem the points. Also, such value may change over time and vary from merchant to merchant and according to the kinds of customers and products associated with the merchants. In addition, it is desired that value be realized from additional marketing that a merchant receives by being a “participating merchant” of the issuer. As a simple solution, the rewards issuer may only charge a periodic flat fee (e.g., $1000 per month) to the merchant. Thus, issuers are challenged to find pricing arrangements that cover their expense, but encourage merchant participation. Payment is often limited to participation fees, or a calculation based on sales volume, or some other complex reporting arrangement. Such arrangements are imprecise and inflexible, and may not actually reflect the value received by the merchant as points are awarded.
There is provided, in accordance with embodiments of the present invention, a system and method for operating a loyalty program within a financial infrastructure (such as one used by a retail coalition or retail channel) managed by a transaction processing entity that processes transactions conducted between customers and merchants, wherein loyalty points are issued by a point issuer and awarded to a customer for conducting transactions with a merchant.
In one embodiment, a method for operating a loyalty program includes establishing qualifying aspects of transactions that give rise to loyalty points, assigning a value to each loyalty point, receiving at a loyalty host a packet of transaction information defining a transaction between a merchant and a customer, identifying qualifying aspects of the transaction from the packet of transaction information, determining loyalty points to be awarded to the customer from the identified qualifying aspects of the transaction, awarding the loyalty points to the customer, and, based on the assigned point value, electronically transferring a monetary amount from an account of the merchant to an account of the point issuer to reflect the value of the awarded loyalty units. The method permits settlement or reconciliation of accounts on a daily basis (or other chosen frequency).
A more complete understanding of the present invention may be derived by referring to the detailed description of the invention and to the claims, when considered in connection with the Figures.
There are various embodiments and configurations for implementing the present invention. Generally, embodiments provide systems and methods for issuing loyalty rewards (points) to customers in connection with retail transactions, and for settling (reconciling) the accounts of the issuer of the points (e.g., a credit card company) and the merchant where the transactions with customers are conducted. The issuer and the merchant assign value to each loyalty point in advance, so that at the time of the transaction the value of the points issued can be determined and recorded.
The issuance of loyalty points is managed by a server located at a processing system or entity that handles transactions conducted at merchant locations. In one embodiment, the processing system is an acquirer system of a credit or debit card network, which includes a loyalty host or server for determining whether points are to be issued for each credit card or debit card transaction authorized by the acquirer or processing system. If issued, the loyalty server creates a record of the points and thereafter transfers monetary amounts between accounts of the merchant and the issuer to reflect the value of the points issued.
In some embodiments, the merchant is a multi-tiered organization with a central merchant organization and a plurality of individual merchant retail locations. Since a value is assigned to each loyalty point in advance (as between the merchant and the issuer), the cost of the points (which is ultimately transferred as a monetary amount to the issuer) can be allocated between the central merchant organization (e.g., a merchant headquarters or a franchisor organization) and the individual merchant locations (e.g., individual stores or franchisees).
It should be noted that the term “point” is used herein in its broadest sense to mean any credit, item, unit or other reward issued or awarded as an incentive in a loyalty program. The reward may be designated as points to be later redeemed by the customer, as in the described embodiments. But the term is intended to broadly encompass other items that could be awarded at the time of a transaction, and may be either intangible items (e.g., a point, monetary unit, or credit) or, alternatively, tangible items (e.g. a gift, certificate, voucher or promotional product) stocked by the merchant and given to the customer upon completion of the transaction. Further, the term “merchant” is used herein in its broadest sense to encompass any entity or business that provides products and services (and that may desire to award loyalty points to any customer who may purchase those products or sources).
Referring now to
The POS devices 110 are connected through a retail network 120 to an acquirer system 122. The network 120 may represent, as examples, a network maintained within a single store having a number of POS devices, a network linking a chain of stores that each have one or more POS devices 110, or a private or public network connecting POS devices at different merchant stores and different merchant chains. Such POS devices 110 collect data pertaining to transactions conducted at the terminals. Thus each devices 110 not only collects the card ID or identifier (identifying the cardholder and his/her account) read at a card reader, but also collects transaction data or information on the specific transaction (purchased product ID, store/merchant ID, transaction amount, etc.).
The acquirer system 122 receives data from the devices 110 (i.e., card identifier and transaction data), and then processes and authorizes (approves/disapproves) the credit card transaction (or a debit card or similar transaction) conducted at the POS devices 110. Acquirer systems are well known, and include those operated by credit card processing entities, such as First Data Corporation, Greenwood Village, Colo. The processing entity reconciles or settles accounts maintained for the merchants, for a card issuing entity (e.g., the bank issuing the card to the consumer), and for a card association (e.g., VISA®), MasterCard®, American Express®, etc.). Thus, as an example, when a credit card transaction is conducted at one of the POS devices 110, the acquirer system 122 may periodically debit an account at a financial institution 132 maintained for the card issuer (in order to pay the merchant), credit an association fee (e.g., a percentage of the transaction amount) to an account at a financial institution 134 maintained for the card association, and credit an account at one of the financial institutions 136-1 though 136-n that are maintained for merchants 1 through n (such merchants being those having transactions conducted at the POS devices 110). For reasons that will be described later, in some embodiments there may be separate accounts for related merchant entitles (e.g., an account for a retail chain headquarters and a separate account for each store location in the retail chain).
Payments among the various accounts are made through a financial network 140, which may represent a banking network through which ACH (Automated Clearinghouse) transfers may be made electronically to the various accounts. It should be noted that while
As further illustrated in
Referring now to
In embodiments of the invention, the financial server 220 is also used to reconcile or settle accounts in response to the issuance of loyalty points and, in some embodiments, in response to redemption of loyalty points. For such purpose, the acquirer system 122 also includes a loyalty server 230 which may manage one or more loyalty reward programs. The server 230 accesses several databases used in connection with the loyalty programs, including a loyalty member database 232, a loyalty merchant database 234, and a loyalty issuer database 236. The member database 232 stores information on each customer or loyalty program member, such as member name, loyalty account number, loyalty point balance, account history (current and previous point balances, past redemptions of points), and so forth. The merchant database 234 stores data on each merchant awarding loyalty points, including merchant name and ID, merchant address, and points that have been awarded by the merchant (i.e., to the customers identified in database 232). In some embodiments, each merchant may be part of a merchant chain or a franchising organization, and thus the merchant information may be hierarchical to match the organization, with (1) central merchant data (corresponding to the central merchant headquarters or the merchant franchisor, and reflecting cumulative data for all individual stores within the organization) and (2) individual merchant location data (the individual merchant data corresponding to each individual merchant store or franchisee). A bank or financial account identifier (bank routing and account number) for each merchant is also stored in the merchant database 234 (from which transfers may be made to the loyalty point issuer). If the merchant organization is hierarchical, an account may be identified for each central organization as well as an account for each individual merchant retail location within the central merchant organization. In some embodiments, there may be also stored in merchant database 234 a value that has been assigned to each loyalty point awarded at merchant locations so that accounts of the issuer and merchants can be reconciled, as will be described later.
The issuer database 236 stores data on each loyalty reward issuer and program, such as the name of the issuer, all transactions giving rise to loyalty rewards in that program (a transaction number, description of goods/services purchased, and points awarded for the transaction), bank or financial account identifiers, and so forth. It should be appreciated that point value data could be stored in issuer database 236 (corresponding to each merchant) in addition to or lieu of being stored in merchant database 234.
As should be apparent in the embodiment seen in
In some embodiments, the transaction processing entity operating the acquirer system 122 manages loyalty programs for a plurality of different loyalty point issuers, and thus there would not only be separate data in database 236 for each such issuer, but also separate data in member database 232 and in merchant database 234 for each such program. For example, in such instance, member database 232 would store a separate loyalty account number, loyalty point balance, and loyalty account history for each program in which a customer is enrolled. Merchant database 234 would likewise store separate merchant loyalty reward data for each loyalty program in which a merchant participates.
While not part of the acquirer system 122,
As one example, if the redemption center 250 is a physical retail location, a customer might visit the center and choose products that can be purchased using points. The redemption center accesses the loyalty server 230 in order for the customer's loyalty program membership to be confirmed and the customer's loyalty account to be accessed. Once a redemption is made, the points are deducted from the loyalty account balance (at database 232).
Turning now to
Initially, and in advance of transactions, qualifying criteria for loyalty transactions are established, at step 310. In some circumstances, the criteria may be simple, such as providing points to any purchase using the credit card (at any merchant), in which case the issuer would award points independently of the merchants and only the issuer database 236 is accessed for qualifying criteria and point award information. However, the acquirer system 122 is designed to also permit more enhanced and flexible loyalty features, such as bonus points being issued when purchases are made at specific merchants or for specific products. In such case, since the loyalty program provides an incentive to make purchases from specific merchants, those merchants and the issuer not only establish the qualifying criteria at step 310 (specific merchant or merchant location, specific product, number of bonus points awarded for the purchase, etc.), but also agree between themselves and assign a value to the points to be awarded, step 312. Examples of assigned values will be given later, but briefly the issuer and merchant could determine the value of loyalty points to the merchant (e.g., based on an anticipated increase in business) and the cost to the issuer (e.g., based on the anticipated cost of administration and cost of redemption), and arrive at a per point value that is to be paid by the merchant to the issuer. In one embodiment, such value is stored by the program administrator at merchant database 234. The assigned value can be easily adjusted or changed from time to time to reflect the experience of the merchant and issuer as points are awarded and redeemed.
When a credit card transaction is conducted at one of the POS terminals 110, transaction data (e.g., card identifier, product identifier, transaction amount) is collected at the POS terminal 110 and transmitted to the card transaction server 212 (step 316). The transaction server provides authorization for the card transaction (step 318) using one or more of the databases 214, 216 and 218, and either approves or disapproves the transaction based on standard qualifying credit criteria, such account existence, cardholder credit limits, merchant participation, and so forth. The transaction is then checked for eligibility under a loyalty program, such as by sending the card identifier and transaction data to the loyalty server 230 (step 320). The loyalty server then identifies and checks the qualifying aspects of the transaction, step 324. In one simple example, if the cardholder is enrolled in a loyalty program administered by the card issuer, then loyalty points could be based solely on the transaction amount (e.g., one point per dollar spent), and thus every transaction would be qualified for that award and the issuer database 236 is checked for the amount of the point awards (one point per dollar or some other predetermined point award per transaction amount). However, points could be based on more sophisticated parameters, such as the type of product purchased or the identity of the merchant where the transaction is taking place. In such circumstances, the loyalty server 230 may check the merchant database to determine the qualifying aspects of the specific transaction with the merchant (at step 324), i.e., whether the merchant or product qualifies for specific awards, and also to determine the number of additional points to be awarded (at step 326).
At step 328, the loyalty server 230 then sends the loyalty information to the POS terminal where the transaction takes place (so that the reward information can provided to the customer, e.g., printed on a receipt) and also makes a record of the reward within issuer database 236, step 332. In one embodiment, the issuer database is used to initiate the reconciliation of issuer and merchant financial accounts to reflect the awarded points, and thus all awards are stored in the issuer database 236 for that purpose. However, it should be appreciated that award data stored in the member and merchant databases 232 and 234 should be updated to reflect current awards, and for that purpose the member and merchant databases 232 and 234 could be updated at the same time.
Periodically (e.g., at the end of each day), settlement takes place. The loyalty server tabulates the value of all the points awarded to customers by each merchant and transfers the value of those points (as a monetary amount) from an account of the merchant to an account of the issuer (step 340). As illustrated in
As also seen in
The progression through the flow diagram in
In
(1) an internal credit card business 612;
(2) an internal debit card business 614;
(3) an internal branch banking business 616 that offer mortgages, small business services (e.g., loans, insurance, etc.), and direct deposit account/savings account services; and
(4) external retail clients 630, including a franchisor 632 having multiple franchisees (Franchisee 1-Franchisee n), an external retail store chain 634 having multiple store locations (Chain Store 1-Chain Store n), and a plurality of individual stores 636 (illustrated as including Smith Clothing Retailer Store 640 and Acme Home Improvement Store 642).
It should be appreciated the card issuer may have arrangements with any one or more of the internal and external businesses, whereby points are awarded for transactions conducted with those businesses.
In this example, it is assumed the credit card business 612 of the card issuer “owns” the program and issues loyalty points (i.e., the acquirer system 122 is operated by a processing entity on behalf of the card issuer and the card issuer is paid by other business when awarding points). It is also assumed that the businesses participating with the card issuer are the credit card business 612, the debit card business 614, the branch banking business 616 (when offering mortgage services), Retail Chain 634, Smith Clothing Retailer Store 640 and Acme Home Improvement Store 642.
Point Rewards (Point Award Criteria for Number of Points to be Awarded)
Credit Card—1 point awarded for each $1 spent by member using credit card
Debit Card—1 point awarded for each $1 spent by member using debit card
Mortgage Business—500 points awarded for any refinance by member
Retail Chain—Bonus of 1 point for each $1 spent using credit card
Smith Clothing Retailer—Bonus of 1 point for each $1 spent using credit/debit card
Acme Home Improvement—Bonus of 1 point for each $1 spent using credit/debit card
Assigned Point Values (Agreed Value of Each Awarded Point)
Credit Card—0.001 per point
Debit Card—0.0025 per point
Mortgage Business—0.0025 per point
Retail Chain—0.005 per point
Smith Clothing Retailer—0.0055 per point
Acme Home Improvement—0.005 per point
Transactions (Transactions Giving Rise to Loyalty Points)
Member uses debit card at Acme Home Improvement and spends $100
Member uses credit card at Smith Clothing Retailer and spends $125
Member refinances a mortgage at Mortgage Business
Member uses credit card at Retail Chain Store 1 and spends $100
Point Allotment (Agreed Allotment Between Central Retail Chain and Chain Stores)
Retail Chain/Retail Chain Store—50/50
Point Awards (Points Awarded from Transaction)
Member receives 100 points for use of debit card (at Acme Home Improvement)
Member receives 100 bonus points for purchase at Acme Home Improvement
Member receives 125 points for use of credit card (at Smith Clothing Retailer)
Member receives 125 bonus points for purchase at Smith Clothing Retailer
Member receives 500 points for refinancing mortgage
Member receives 100 points for use of credit card (at Retail Chain Store 1)
Member receives 100 bonus points for purchase at Retail Chain Store 1
Account Reconciliation (Monetary Amounts Transferred to Issuer for Points Awarded)
Credit Card Business transfers 22.5¢ to card issuer (purchases at Smith Clothing and Retail chain Store 1)
Debit Card Business transfers 25¢ to card issuer (purchase at Acme Hone Improvement)
Acme Home Improvement transfers 50¢ to card issuer
Smith Clothing Retailer transfers 68.75¢ to card issuer
Mortgage Business transfers $1.25 to card issuer
Retail Chain transfers 25¢ to card issuer
Retail Chain Store 1 transfers 25¢ to card issuer
In the forgoing example, it should be understood that while the monetary amounts are illustrated as being transferred with each transaction (from the account of the business rewarding the points to the account of the card issuer), such amounts would most likely be accumulated over time, and then periodically (daily, weekly, monthly) reported and transferred. In alternative embodiments, the loyalty server 230 or financial server 220 might maintain financial accounts (apart from a financial institution or bank) for each of the parties and perform the reconciliation (resulting from points being issued) at those accounts, and then later at specified times use those accounts and their balances to initiate ACH transfers to accounts maintained for the parties at financial institutions (such as the financial institutions illustrated in
While a detailed description of presently preferred embodiments of the invention has been given above, various alternatives, modifications, and equivalents will be apparent to those skilled in the art without varying from the spirit of the invention. For example, while the card transaction server 212, financial server 220, and loyalty server 230 are illustrated as separate systems, any or all of those servers could be combined into a single server/host that is programmed to carry out the functions described herein. In the same manner, while cardholder database 214, merchant database 216, transaction database 218, member database 232, merchant database 234, and issuer database 236 are illustrated as separate database systems, any or all could be combined into a single database system within acquirer system 122 or accessed as an external database. As another example, while the loyalty server 230 is illustrated as included in acquirer system 122 for use as part of credit and debit card transactions, it should be appreciated that the loyalty server 230 could be resident in other transaction processing systems (e.g., financial transaction processing systems such as check processing systems, ATM transaction processing systems, and so forth).
Therefore, the above description should not be taken as limiting the scope of the invention, which is defined by the appended claims.