Appeal No. 2006-1128 Application No. 10/215,877 systems, such as that of Caulfield, as evidenced by Zhao, p. 187, right hand column, bottom paragraph. The appellants argue the absence of a queue let alone designating a payment transaction dispute to such a queue [See Brief at p. 13] Lynn shows multiple queues and designating a transaction into one of the queues based on a decision regarding the current transaction in Fig. 5. Caulfield shows multiple queues and designating a transaction into one of the queues based on a decision regarding the transaction on p. 10 line 10 through p. 13, line 9 describing a queue of transactions for chargeback clearing, retrieval request fulfillment, representment, et al. Accordingly, the appellants’ argument of the absence of a queue let alone designating a payment transaction dispute to such a queue is unpersuasive. The appellants argue there would be no motivation to combine a highly automated Caulfield process with Lynn’s workflow process as there would be no need for an investigator. Caulfield describes the active participation of an investigator within the operation of the system at p. 15 lines 16 to 18. Further, each of the outcomes described on pp. 10 through 13 either explicitly or implicitly require some definite or potential intervention by investigators. Further, nothing in the claim describes whether an investigator is a person or a machine process. We also note that the claim never introduces the investigator initially into the claim, and never characterizes the investigator by personal attributes, but refers to an investigator as “said investigator” in all instances of the word “investigator” in the claim, and therefore there is sufficient ambiguity to encompass whatever form of investigator is reasonable in the context of 7Page: Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 NextLast modified: November 3, 2007