A computer-implemented method for facilitating an automatic transmission of an electronic receipt to a user completing an electronic transaction at a merchant computing device, comprising:
- receiving, by one or more processors of the merchant computing device configured by executing instructions therein, transaction information concerning the electronic transaction;
- electronically reading user-account information from a user's personal transaction device using the one or more configured processors of the merchant computing device and an associated electronic reader, wherein the user's personal transaction device is physically presented by the user to the electronic reader and includes a computer readable memory having the user-account information and a plurality of electronic contact addresses associated with the user and contact preferences for the user stored in one or more fields of the memory, the contact preferences concerning the automatic transmission of an electronic receipt to one or more of the plurality of electronic contact addresses, and wherein the user-account information is read from one or more fields of the memory reserved for storing user-account information;
- automatically capturing, using the one or more configured processors of the merchant computing device and the associated electronic reader, the plurality of electronic contact addresses and contact preferences for the user stored in the one or more fields of the personal transaction device memory, wherein the capturing step includes:
- electronically reading one or more fields of the memory reserved for non-user-account information;
- determining, using the one or more configured processors, whether the electronically read non-user-account information includes one or more electronic contact addresses, wherein the determining step includes analyzing the captured information for indicators that the electronically read non-user-account information corresponds to one or more prescribed types of electronic contact addresses;
- presenting, using the one or more configured processors of the merchant computing device, the captured plurality of electronic contact addresses to the user through a display of the merchant computing device, wherein the presenting step includes:
- masking at least a portion of the plurality of electronic contact addresses, and displaying the plurality of electronic contact addresses to the user in a masked format, wherein masking comprises obscuring the at least the portion from the user;
- receiving, using the one or more configured processors of the merchant computing device via an input device of the merchant computing device, user instructions from the user concerning the automatic transmission of the electronic receipt to one or more of the captured plurality of electronic contact addresses;
- transmitting, using the one or more configured processors of the merchant computing device, a transaction request including the transaction information, the user-account information, the user instructions, one or more of the captured plurality of electronic contact addresses corresponding to the one or more prescribed types and the contact preferences to a plurality of remote computing devices over a communications network;
- causing, using the one or more configured processors of the merchant computing device, one or more of the plurality of remote computing devices to process the electronic transaction according to the transaction information and the user-account information;
- and
- causing, using the one or more configured processors of the merchant computing device, one or more other remote computing devices among the plurality of remote computing devices to automatically transmit an electronic receipt concerning the processed electronic transaction to the one or more of the plurality of electronic contact addresses, wherein the electronic receipt is selectively transmitted by the other remote computing devices to the one or more electronic addresses according to the contact preferences for the user and the user instructions.