Appeal 2007-2742
Application 09/764,618
1 Thus, the Appellants have not sustained their burden of showing that
2 Bogosian fails to describe an automatic payment method after the conclusion of the
3 electronic auction.
4 The Appellants’ second argument is that the reliance on a credit card to pay the
5 seller fails to anticipate automated deduction of funds from a payment account and
6 transference to a user (seller) account. The Appellants’ explanation linking this
7 operation to the claimed plurality of payment accounts appears to argue that the
8 customer has not transferred a cash balance into the auctioneer’s payment
9 accounts, from which payments are transferred to sellers (Br. 20:Bottom ¶ - 21:Top
10 line).
11 We find that claim 21 is broader than such a narrow construction. As we
12 construed above, an account is a record of a customer having a business or credit
13 relationship. Therefore a payment account is such a record that is used to record
14 payments by a customer. By the terms of claim 21, the payment accounts must be
15 maintained by the auction system and be capable of storing funds. Those
16 customers who sign up for using Amazon 1-click have payment accounts so
17 maintained (FF 16). Storing a credit card number inherently stores funds as
18 construed supra, a source of supply of money or other financial resource, and thus
19 is capable of storing funds.
20 As to the specific operations of debiting payor purchases accounts and
21 crediting payee sales accounts, we find that this is conventional in any accounting
22 system.
23 The Appellants have not sustained their burden of showing that the Examiner
24 erred in rejecting claims 21-23.
25 Independent Claim 24
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