United Services Automobile Association – InsuranceNewsNet

2022 NOV 18 (NewsRx) — By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News — United Services Automobile Association (San Antonio, Texas, United States) has been issued patent number 11489842, according to news reporting originating out of Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx editors.

The patent’s inventors are Russell, Ryan Thomas (San Antonio, TX, US).

This patent was filed on December 27, 2019 and was published online on November 1, 2022.

From the background information supplied by the inventors, news correspondents obtained the following quote: “Financial account management tools have become an increasingly important resource for the average consumer. Financial services, particularly those now available for use via computing devices, can provide consumers the versatility and freedom to control their assets and credit. However, consumers with many different financial accounts, such as credit card accounts, utility accounts, mortgage accounts, etc., may have trouble keeping current with account balances, payments and other transactions. The consequences of mis-management may result in penalties being assessed against the consumer by the providing the accounts. For example, penalties may be associated with late payments or balance thresholds that are exceeded by a consumer. This type of issue is exacerbated when the account is co-held (e.g., a joint banking account) and one account holder incurs expenses that the other account holder is unaware of, at least until some time has passed following the transaction. For example, couples or parent-child account members may use a joint bank account and have joint credit or debit card accounts, whereby each person in the group individually draws on the same account and independently charges purchases to the joint account. If prompt communication regarding each purchase is not provided to the other members of the group, the charges may reach the credit card limit and/or the account may become overdrawn.

“Thus, the costs associated with failures to communicate these payments to all account holders can be significant. Furthermore, in cases of a joint account in which one person is a guardian or the “primary owner” (such as a parent) and the other is a dependent or a “secondary owner” (such as a child), the primary owner can have a strong interest in reviewing some or all financial transactions related to the joint financial transactions in order to monitor expenditures and ensure that money is spent according to a proposed budget or other their personal expectations. Conventional methods of managing financial activities of other account holders (e.g., a joint bank account) do not provide a fine level of control or granularity for the primary owner to customize and personalize their expectations and limits of account-related financial activities. Additionally, conventional methods do not provide a secure method to manage third parties that may be able to control access to funds on behalf of the primary account holder. Additionally, conventional methods do not provide ways to authorize transactions when the primary account owner is unavailable to approve the transaction.

“There is a need in the art for a system and method that addresses the shortcomings discussed above.”

Supplementing the background information on this patent, NewsRx reporters also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “In one aspect, a method for securely enrolling a delegate in a service that allows the delegate to manage access to funds held in a bank account includes steps of establishing communication with a banking application running on a user device through an account management service, receiving information indicating that a user of the banking application wants to enroll a new delegate for approving access to funds held in the bank account by a secondary user, receiving information about the new delegate, where the information includes a phone number, and automatically generating a message for the new delegate on the user device. The message includes a name of the user, an authentication token, and an authenticating web address. The method also includes steps of automatically sending the generated message using a messaging service, and enrolling the new delegate so that the new delegate can manage access to funds held in the bank account by the secondary user.

“In another aspect, a method for securely enrolling a delegate in a service that allows the delegate to manage access to funds held in a bank account includes the steps of establishing communication with a banking application running on a user device through an account management service, receiving information indicating that a user of the banking application wants to enroll a new delegate for approving access to funds held in the bank account by a secondary user, receiving information about the new delegate, receiving a delegate approval policy for the new delegate, determining an authorization level based on the delegate approval policy, and automatically generating a message for the new delegate on the user device and sending the message to the new delegate using a messaging service. The message includes a request to provide identification information. The method also includes steps of receiving identification information from the new delegate, and enrolling the new delegate so that the new delegate can manage access to funds held in the bank account by the secondary user.

“In another aspect, a system for securely enrolling a delegate in a service that allows the delegate to manage access to funds held in a bank account includes a primary approver interface for communicating with a user device, where the user device is associated with a primary account holder of the bank account. The system also includes a delegate enrollment module for enrolling delegates that can manage access to funds held in the bank account on behalf of the primary account holder and a delegate communication module for communicating with delegates.

“Other systems, methods, features, and advantages of the disclosure will be, or will become, apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art upon examination of the following figures and detailed description. It is intended that all such additional systems, methods, features, and advantages be included within this description and this summary, be within the scope of the disclosure, and be protected by the following claims.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A method for securely enrolling a delegate in a service that allows the delegate to manage access to funds held in a bank account associated with a primary user, the method comprising: establishing communication with a banking application running on a device associated with the primary user through an account management service; receiving information via the banking application indicating that the primary user wants to enroll a new delegate for approving access to funds held in the bank account by a secondary user; receiving information about the new delegate, wherein the information includes a phone number; automatically generating a message for the new delegate on the user device, wherein the message includes: a name of the user; an authentication token; and an authenticating web address; automatically sending the generated message using a messaging service; enrolling the new delegate so that the new delegate can manage access to funds held in the bank account by the secondary user; determining a relational depth for the new delegate, the relational depth being a measure of interpersonal relationship distance between either the primary account holder or the secondary user and the new delegate; and suggesting that the primary user add at least one additional delegate based on the relational depth of the new delegate; thereby improving a probability that a transaction will be approved if the new delegate is unavailable and the transaction must be approved by one or more of the of the additional delegates.

“2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the messaging service is a short messaging service.

“3. The method according to claim 2, wherein the message is a text message.

“4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the step of determining a relational depth for the new delegate includes determining a relationship depth relative to the secondary user.

“5. The method according to claim 4, wherein the step of suggesting that the user add at least one additional delegate based on the relational depth of the new delegate includes the additional delegate having a different relational depth as the new delegate.

“6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the method includes prompting the user to add a financial institution associated with the bank account as a delegate.

“7. A method for securely enrolling a delegate in a service that allows the delegate to manage access to funds held in a bank account, the method comprising: establishing communication with a banking application running on a user device through an account management service; receiving information indicating that a user of the banking application wants to enroll a new delegate for approving access to funds held in the bank account by a secondary user; receiving information about the new delegate; receiving a delegate approval policy for the new delegate; determining an authorization level based on the delegate approval policy, the authorization level being associated with a maximum transaction dollar amount that can be approved by the new delegate; automatically generating a message for the new delegate on the user device and sending the message to the new delegate using a messaging service, wherein the message includes a request to provide identification information; receiving identification information from the new delegate; enrolling the new delegate so that the new delegate can manage access to funds held in the bank account by the secondary user; determining a relational depth for the new delegate, the relational depth being a measure of interpersonal relationship distance between the primary account holder and the new delegate; and suggesting that the primary user add at least one additional delegate having a different relational depth as the new delegate; thereby improving a probability that a transaction will be approved if the new delegate is unavailable and the transaction must be approved by one or more of the of the additional delegates.

“8. The method according to claim 7, wherein the messaging service is a short messaging service.

“9. The method according to claim 7, wherein the type of identification information requested in the message depends on the authorization level.

“10. The method according to claim 9, wherein the method includes requesting that the new delegate send an image including a photo ID to the account management service.

“11. The method according to claim 9, wherein the method includes requesting that the delegate send a photo of the delegate to the user device.

“12. The method according to claim 9, wherein the method includes requesting that the delegate participate in a three-way call with the user and a representative of an institution holding the bank account.

“13. A system for securely enrolling a delegate in a service that allows the delegate to manage access to funds held in a bank account, the system comprising: a smart phone, associated with a user; a primary approver interface for communicating with the smart phone, wherein the smart phone is associated with a primary account holder of the bank account; a delegate enrollment module for enrolling delegates that can manage access to funds held in the bank account on behalf of the primary account holder; the delegate enrollment module further including a relational depth module for determining a relational depth for the new delegate, the relational depth being a measure of interpersonal relationship distance between a secondary user associated with the bank account and the new delegate; the relational depth module further being configured to suggest that the primary account holder add at least one additional delegate based on the relational depth of the new delegate; thereby improving a probability that at least one of the new delegate and the at least one additional delegate will be available to engage in management of access to the funds held in the bank account by the secondary user when needed; and a delegate communication module for communicating with delegates.

“14. The system according to claim 13, wherein the relational depth module is configured to determine if the primary approver has enrolled a plurality of delegates having different relational depth values.

“15. The system according to claim 13, wherein the delegate enrollment module includes a delegate approval policy module for selecting policy approval settings associated with how the delegates can manage access to funds held in the account.

“16. The system according to claim 15, wherein the delegate enrollment module includes an identity verification module that can determine a type of identity information to request from a delegate based on the approval policy settings associated with the delegate.

“17. The system according to claim 13, wherein the system includes an automated approval module that can approve or deny fund requests when no delegates are available.

“18. The system according to claim 13, wherein the automated approval module reviews transaction histories for the bank account to determine if a fund request should be approved or denied.

“19. The system according to claim 13, wherein the delegate enrollment module automatically generates enrollment links that can be sent to a proposed delegate using a short messaging service from the smart phone.

“20. The system according to claim 13, wherein the delegate communication module communicates with the delegate using a short messaging service.”

For the URL and additional information on this patent, see: Russell, Ryan Thomas. Methods and systems for managing delegates for secure account fund transfers. U.S. Patent Number 11489842, filed December 27, 2019, and published online on November 1, 2022. Patent URL: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=11489842.PN.&OS=PN/11489842RS=PN/11489842

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