System and method for processing currency bills and documents bearing barcodes in a document processing device

A document processing device, comprising:

• an input receptacle adapted to receive currency bills and substitute currency media, at least one of the substitute currency media including at least a first barcode pattern representative of a ticket number and a second barcode pattern representative of a value,
• at least one output receptacle adapted to receive currency bills and substitute currency media after the currency bills and substitute currency media have been evaluated;
• a transport mechanism adapted to transport the currency bills and substitute currency media, one at a time, from the input receptacle to the at least one output receptacle along a transport path;
• an evaluation unit comprising at least one currency detector disposed along the transport path between the input receptacle and the output receptacle, the at least one currency detector being capable of evaluating currency bills, and a first media detector disposed along the transport path between the input receptacle and the output receptacle, the first media detector being capable of detecting the first barcode pattern and the second barcode pattern;
• a controller coupled to the evaluation unit, the controller being adapted to control the operation of the transport mechanism and the operation of the evaluation unit;
• and
• a communications port coupled to the controller, the communications port being adapted to transmit at least one of the ticket number associated with the first barcode pattern and the value associated with the second barcode pattern

An apparatus for processing both currency bills and substitute currency media, comprising:

• an input receptacle adapted to receive currency bills and substitute currency media, each of the substitute currency media including at least a first barcode pattern encoding a number and a second barcode pattern encoding a value associated with the number;
• at least one output receptacle adapted to receive currency bills and substitute currency media after the currency bills and substitute currency media have been evaluated,
• a transport mechanism adapted to transport the currency bills and substitute currency media, one at a time, from the input receptacle to the at least one output receptacle along a transport path,
• an evaluation unit comprising at least one detector disposed along the transport path between the input receptacle and the output receptacle, the at least one detector being capable of evaluating currency bills and of decoding the number encoded in the first barcode pattern and the value encoded in the second barcode pattern on each of the substitute currency media, one of the substitute currency media on which a number and a value are decoded being termed a valid substitute currency medium, and
• a controller coupled to the evaluation unit, the controller being adapted to control the operation of the transport mechanism and the operation of the evaluation unit, the controller including a memory, the memory being adapted to store the number and the value of each valid substitute currency medium decoded by the detector

A document processing device in a system having a plurality of machines adapted to accept documents, the plurality of machines being coupled to an accounting system, the document processing device comprising:

• an input receptacle adapted to receive a stack of documents including currency bills and substitute currency media, each of the substitute currency media including at least a first barcode pattern encoding a number and a second barcode pattern encoding a value;
• at least one output receptacle adapted to receive the stack of documents after the currency bills and substitute currency media have been evaluated,
• a transport mechanism adapted to transport the currency bills and substitute currency media, one at a time, from the input receptacle to the at least one output receptacle along a transport path,
• an evaluation unit comprising at least one detector disposed along the transport path between the input receptacle and the output receptacle, the at least one detector being capable of evaluating currency bills and of decoding the number encoded in the first barcode pattern and the value encoded in the second barcode pattern on each of the substitute currency media, and
• a controller coupled to the evaluation unit, the controller being adapted to control the operation of the transport mechanism and the operation of the evaluation unit, the controller further being adapted to store the number and the value of each substitute currency medium to a file.

A method of processing both currency bills and substitute currency media in a document processing device, the method comprising:

• receiving a stack of documents including currency bills and substitute currency media to be evaluated in an input receptacle of the device;
• transporting each of the documents, one document at a time, past a currency detector and past a media detector;
• scanning each document to obtain characteristic information associated with a currency bill;
• scanning each document to obtain characteristic information associated with a substitute currency medium, the characteristic information including a first barcode pattern and a second barcode pattern;
• determining whether each document meets or fails at least one criterion;
• and
• directing each document to at least one output receptacle based on the step of determining

A method of processing documents, comprising:

• accepting a plurality of documents including substitute currency media into an input receptacle of a document processing device, each of the substitute currency media including more than one barcode pattern thereon;
• transporting each of the documents, one document at a time, past a detector;
• scanning each document via the detector for at least a first barcode pattern and a second barcode pattern, a document having a decodable first barcode pattern and a decodable second barcode pattern being termed a valid substitute currency medium,
• first decoding for each valid substitute currency medium the first barcode pattern into a first set of characters representing identification information;
• second decoding for each valid substitute currency medium the second barcode pattern into a second set of characters representing an amount of currency;
• and
• directing each document to at least one output receptacle

A method of processing documents, comprising the steps of

• generating pre-processed document data indicative of characteristic information of currency bills and substitute currency media received and dispensed by a document accepting device, the substitute currency media having a first barcode pattern encoding a number and a second barcode pattern encoding a value,
• processing the currency bills and substitute currency media in a document processing device;
• first decoding, in the document processing device, the first barcode pattern on each substitute currency media into the number,
• second decoding, in the document processing device, the second barcode pattern on each substitute currency media into the value;
• providing the number and the value of each substitute currency media to an accounting system;
• and
• reconciling in the accounting system the number and the value of each substitute currency media with the pre-processed document data