Electronic account presentation and response system and method

Abstract

An Information Interface Provider (IIP) acting as the interface between a biller and its customers for both the presentment of electronic bills to the customers and for the processing of payments from the biller's customers. The IIP creates and electronically publishes bills to the biller's customers in response to data provided by the biller and processes the payments in response to instructions provided by the customers. Bill publication is accomplished by any and/or all channels of distribution which are effective in reaching the customers of the biller including Internet web sites, Email and personal digital assistants, for example. Once billing data has been received by the IIP, the IIP formats the billing data for storage in its own internal database and then performs the task of reformatting the bill for the particular channel(s) of distribution selected by the customer. Several types of customer payments are processed by the IIP including Automated Clearing House (ACH) payments, credit or debit card payments, paper checks, smart card payments, and digital currency payments. Once the IIP has debited the consumer's account for the payment, it credits the account of the biller. The IIP consolidates all of the Accounts Receivable (A/R) information and presents the biller with a single file which can then be used by the biller to update its own internal A/R systems.