Lease model for avoiding permanent card locking
AssigneeVerizon Patent and Licensing Inc.
InventorsGregory L. Mumford, Jon E. Abel, David A. Fitzgerald, Radhika Gunasekar, Anna Marie Appleby, John M. Leslein
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Methods relating to prepaid services include determining an unlocked status of an account configured to track usage of prepaid services. The methods further include locking the account for a length of time after the determining step. The methods further include providing, for a service period, a service to a user associated with the account subsequent to the locking step, and continuously extending the locking for an additional length of time throughout the service period.
Claims20
A computer-device-implemented method, comprising:
- accessing, via a user, an account to track usage of prepaid services;
- determining whether the account is locked or unlocked;
- providing the user with information regarding a time period that the account will be locked, if the account is determined to be locked;
- locking the account for a length of time, if the account is determined to be unlocked;
- controlling a provision of a prepaid service, of the prepaid services, to the user, the prepaid service being provided for a prepaid service period while the account is locked;
- and
- extending the length of time that the account will be locked by an additional length of time during the prepaid service period.
A system, comprising:
- a prepaid account to be accessed by a user of an originating device;
- a memory to store information associated with the prepaid account;
- at least one call processing server communicatively coupled to the memory;
- and
- an account record, stored in the memory, the account record including a locked time field to store an entry value indicative of an expiration of a lock of the prepaid account,
- where the at least one call processing server is to prevent a provision of a service, to the user of the originating device, based on a determination that a reference time is less than the entry in the locked time field of the account record, associated with the prepaid account that is accessed by the user of the originating device.
A method, comprising:
- monitoring an attempt to receive a prepaid service by a service requestor having a prepaid account;
- preventing the service requestor from receiving the prepaid service based on a determination that a reference time is earlier than an entry stored in a locked time field of a record associated with the prepaid account, where the entry indicates an expiration of a lock of the prepaid account;
- setting the entry in the locked time field to a future time, the future time being a certain time after the reference time;
- and
- providing the prepaid service to the service requestor based on a comparison of the entry stored in the locked time field to the future time.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.