Appeal No. 2001-1862
Application No. 09/102,044
that the language of independent claim 53 does not require embossing or other marking
at the time of issuance as discussed above.
Similarly, appellants’ representative disputed that there is no evidence of the
card being accepted for purchase anywhere the predetermined credit network is
accepted for purchase. (See also brief at page 9.) Here, we find the language of
independent claim 53 to be broader than appellants may have intended since the use
of a credit card or prepaid gift card at a single department store would have been
sufficient as a credit network, in our view. Additionally, the examiner maintains that the
determination of which merchants will accept the card is “purely contractual” and that it
would have been obvious to maximize the number of participating merchants. (See
answer at page 31.) We agree with the examiner. Additionally, Maritz teaches that
“[s]election of merchants is carefully calculated to reflect provision of ‘trophy’
merchandise . . . the card may not be used at all MasterCard merchants.” Here, we
view the teaching of Maritz to be a teaching of alternatives may be solely in a
“selection” from the set of all merchants. In our view, “all merchants” is an equally
feasible option which may be chosen as to limit the selection to a smaller set.
Furthermore, if the employees provided feedback desiring more selection, it would have
been obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art at the time of the invention that “all
merchants” may then be selected to meet the desires of the employees. Therefore, we
disagree with appellants that Your Choice teaches away from the use of all merchants.
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