Financial management system

#This invention relates to financial systems and to the management of assets by individual consumers. This system provides individual consumers with access to their financial assets 24 hours a day with speed and flexibility from hundreds of locations. The invention enables customers to immediately convert a selected portion of their financial assets into different forms of assets.

#The contemporary typical consumer practice to maintain assets is by maintenance of bank checking accounts, separate credit card accounts, and unconnected store credit, debit and charge accounts in order to pay for purchases made and make payments for financial and other products and services. Although this current system is profitable for traditional banks, and credit card associations, in terms of transaction fees and interest collected, this fragmentation of mechanisms for managing personal financial assets is cumbersome and costly for consumers, retailers and other parties to financial payment transactions. Given recently developed hardware and software technology, sophisticated data processing services, secure access and identification technology and one or more FDIC-insured Banks (“Bank”), it is feasible to provide customers with a menu of financial and payment services through an integrated service provider and a single host processor.

#Given these problems, it is the object of this invention to provide an integrated and seamless system for individuals to directly manage their financial assets.

#FIG. 1 is a flow chart of the basic architectural aspects of this invention and a flow of various transactions,

#FIG. 2 is a flow chart illustrating setup transactions for a Program Account, and

#FIG. 3 is a schematic chart of Program Account components.

#Referring now to FIGS. 1, 2, and 3, the basic architectural aspects and relationships of this financial transactions network are depicted. Access to the financial transactions network is achieved through Merchant point of sale (“POS”) terminals depicted in FIG. 3. As will be appreciated, these are terminals, typically located at check-out locations at the merchant stores. This system can accommodate any number of POS locations, limited only by host processor capability. Dedicated software featuring a menu-driven system with multiple levels of security, formatted screens for data input, and local editing capability is provided for each POS. The ability to format and transmit instructions, receive confirmations from the host processor and make inquiries to a customer's accounts is provided from the POS. The specific aspects of programming such terminals are well within the state of the art, typified by the sophistication of current ATM technology. The POS terminals are utilized to establish credit balances in the customer's Individual Program Account (“IPA”). These IPAs include, but are not limited to, stored value accounts and demand deposit accounts (“DDAs”).

#The Figures show the interrelationship among the basic elements of the financial transactions network, or, the Program Account system: 1. The customer's Individual Program Account (“IPA”). 2. The customer's Stored Value Account (“SVA”). 3. The Bank. 4. The customer's Demand Deposit Account (“DDA”) and other accounts at a Bank. 5. The Merchant's DDA and other accounts at a Bank. 6. The host processor.

#The IPA provides customers with access to basic banking services and to a broad array of other financial products and financial services. The customer enrolls in the PA by completing a comprehensive application that lists the financial products and financial services offered by the PA. As they complete the application, customers chose the financial products and financial services they wish to include in their IPA. Thus, an IPA is unique to that particular customer. IPA services are accessed by an Access Device, such as a card, that the participant receives upon enrollment in the Program. It will be apparent that other secured access means are known without requiring the use of physical devices such as security cards, locks, PIN's and the like. Communication by the customer with the financial transaction network is established, for example, from the POS terminals, kiosks on Merchant's premises, as well as by personal computer, telephone, mail and direct deposit.