US 8,554,692 B2Granted

System and method to validate consumables installed in a printing system

AssigneeXerox Corporation

InventorsMatthew O. Scrafford, Jason C. Tsongas

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Abstract

The disclosure relates to a computerized method and system for tracking consumer replaceable units (CRU) used in products such as printing systems. In the method the CRUM ID and destination of the consumable is retrieved on shipment from a supplier. When the consumer replaceable unit is installed in a device such as printing system, the device reports the installation back to a management application. The management application then proceeds to authorize the consumable for the reporting printing system, offer to transfer ownership, or when the printing system is not a managed device then offers a customer the option of being billed for the consumable. The management application has the option of disabling printing with customer replaceable unit when reassignment or intent to purchase is not available. When the consumable is returned the management application can ascertain if the customer replaceable unit was used by its assigned printing device.

Claims9

Dependent claims

A method to track a consumable serial number at a time of shipping for comparison to an installed serial number of at least one customer replaceable unit in a printer system, the method comprising:

creating a storage structure containing an identification code for at least one customer replaceable unit and a destination code for an intended printer system to which the at least one customer replaceable unit is assigned for use;
receiving from a user printer system in which the at least one customer replaceable unit is installed for use an identification code of the at least one installed customer replaceable unit;
analyzing with a processor that references the storage structure the received identification code from the user printer system to determine whether the at least one installed customer replaceable unit is being used in the intended printer system to which it is assigned;
enabling the at least one installed customer replaceable unit when it is determined that the at least one installed customer replaceable unit is being used in the intended printer system to which it is assigned;
determining with the processor whether the user printer system in which the at least one installed customer replaceable unit is being used is a managed printer system when it is determined that the at least one installed customer replaceable unit is not being used in the intended printer system to which it is assigned;
determining with the processor for a managed printer system whether the at least one installed customer replaceable unit can be reassigned to the user printer system;
and
reassigning with the processor the at least one installed customer replaceable unit to the user printer system when it is determined that the at least one installed customer replaceable unit can be reassigned to the user printer system.

5 more elements

A non-transitory computer readable medium having executable instructions recorded thereon that, when executed by a processor, cause the processor to execute steps of a method comprising:

storing in a storage device a data structure containing an identification code for at least one customer replaceable unit and a destination code for an intended printer system to which the at least one customer replaceable unit is assigned for use;
receiving from a user printer system in which the at least one customer replaceable unit is installed for use an identification code of the at least one installed customer replaceable unit;
analyzing, with reference to the storage device, the received identification code from the user printer system to determine whether the at least one installed customer replaceable unit is being used in the intended printer system to which it is assigned;
enabling the at least one installed customer replaceable unit when it is determined that the at least one installed customer replaceable unit is being used in the intended printer system to which it is assigned;
determining if the user printer system in which the at least one installed customer replaceable unit is being used is a managed printer system when it is determined that the at least one installed customer replaceable unit is not being used in the intended printer system to which it is assigned;
determining for a managed printer system if the at least one installed customer replaceable unit can be reassigned to the user printer system;
and
reassigning the at least one installed customer replaceable unit to the user printer system when it is determined that the at least one installed customer replaceable unit can be reassigned to the user printer system.

5 more elements

A computerized system to track consumable serial numbers at a time of shipping for comparison to an installed serial number of at least one customer replaceable unit in a printer system, comprising:

a first computer that stores in a database serial numbers of customer replaceable units and printing devices to which the customer replaceable units are respectively assigned;
and
a second computer that, when one or more of the customer replaceable units are replaced in a user printing device, receives an output from the user printing device, the output comprising serial numbers of the replaced customer replaceable unit, the second computer being further programmed to:
analyzing the serial number to determine whether the replaced customer replaceable unit is installed being used in an assigned printing device, enable the replaced customer replaceable unit when it is determined that the replaced customer replaceable unit is being used in an assigned printing device;
determine if the printing device in which the customer replaceable unit is replaced is a managed printing device when it is determined that the replaced customer replaceable unit is not being used in an assigned printing device;
determine for a managed printing device whether the at least one installed customer replaceable unit can be reassigned to the user printing device;
and
reassign the replaced customer replaceable unit to the user printing device when it is determined that the replaced customer replaceable unit can be reassigned to the user printing device.

5 more elements

Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.