Appeal No. 2006-1123
Application No. 09/766,934
Appellant argues that Ensel does not teach or suggest the customer specific
formatting of bills. (See brief at page 4) .
Ensel states in col. 6, lines 43-50:
As described in more detail below, it is the responsibility of the IIP 20 to
reformat the billing data 55 in the format required for its own internal
databases and then to format the actual published bill, statement or other
information as is appropriate for the channel of distribution particular to a
specific customer 80 receiving the presented bill or other information.
Although Appellant acknowledges this teaching, Appellant characterizes it as
formatting specific to a channel and not to a customer.
In response, we initially note that the word “customer” is absent from claim 1.
Claim 1 refers to a client instead. Appellant indicates in the arguments that the claimed
client is a customer, but no such definition is apparent from the disclosure. Further, in
Ensel, both the biller and the customer are clients of the intermediary service taught and
claimed in Ensel. We note that claim 1 is sufficiently broad to encompass either of
Ensel’s clients. Further, to the extent the customer in Ensel designates a channel, and
Ensel teaches formats specific to each channel, among other formatting options, the
customer is designating a format specific to that customer, albeit perhaps indirectly via
the channel selection. Beyond that, Ensel teaches customer specific bill formatting
provided by the data representing:
a preferred presentment vehicle (channel of distribution) and alternate
presentment vehicles; customer presentment preferences (e.g., present
my bill as soon as available, at the end of month, exception presentment
(only present my bill if dollar amount exceeds a limit, otherwise
automatically pay the bill, generate a paper bill if condition X occurs . . . ));
presentment configuration data (e.g., Email address, Email
system/protocol, browser type and version . . . ); bill format preferences
(e.g., send me summary only, partial details, full details . . . ); reminder
preferences . (Ensel, col. 10, l. 27-37).
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