Automated electronic document filing system, method, and article of manufacture

Abstract

An automated electronic filing system including a web server coupled to a wide area network, a receiving agency server coupled to the wide area network, and a client machine coupled to the wide area network for communication with the web server. The web server serves as an interface to the receiving agency server, the client machine providing information to the web server forming at least a part of an electronic document to be filed with the receiving agency server by the web server. The web server and the receiving agency server can communicate directly with each other without going through the wide area network, such as via a local area network (not shown) or by a direct connection between the servers (also not shown). Preferably, the web server and the receiving agency server communicate with each other over the wide area network, which is preferably a TCP/IP protocol network such as the Internet. A method for electronically filing documents in accordance with the present invention includes providing an HTML based form to a client machine coupled to a TCP/IP network, at least partially automatically filling-in the form based upon input from the client machine, verifying information on the form based upon stored heuristics, and submitting the form to a receiving agency over the network. Additional information is usually added to the form based upon input from the client machine prior to verifying the information.