The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 07, 2004
Filed:
Aug. 08, 2002
Robert Harris, Christchurch, GB;
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
A system and method of usage charging at any one of multiple access points to a facility involves the presentation by a user of a personalized electronic storage device, such as a smartcard, at an access point. A history of previous usage is stored on the storage device and compared at the access point with a locally stored tariff table of differential prices for different combinations of usage. An appropriate charge is then indicated to the user and, upon payment, permission to use the facility is granted and recorded in the usage history. The charge for an instance of use is variable according to the tariff table in dependence on the previous usage history.