Open ticket payment handling with offline mode

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-2016307176-A1
Application number	US-201514686381-A
Country	US
Kind code	A1
Filing date	Apr 14, 2015
Priority date	Apr 14, 2015
Publication date	Oct 20, 2016
Grant date	—

Abstract

A payment handling system may operate to handle payments for the cost of a transaction in which one or more devices operate in an offline mode. The payment handling system may allow for merchant devices to make modifications to local versions of an open ticket while in an off-line mode. When a merchant device subsequently enters an online mode, the systems and techniques may operate to reconcile differences between the local versions of the open ticket.

First claim

1 . One or more computer-readable media storing instructions executable by one or more processors, wherein the instructions program the one or more processors to perform acts comprising:
receiving, by a first point-of-sale (POS) device of a merchant, a first input of a first customer order associated with a transaction between the merchant and one or more customers, the first POS device configured with a cellular data connection and a WiFi connection; storing the first customer order as an open ticket with an associated versioning data structure in a memory of the first POS device; based at least in part on the first POS device and a second POS device of the merchant being in an online mode, receiving, by the second POS device, from the first POS device, a copy of the open ticket and a copy of the associated versioning data structure, the second POS device configured without a cellular data connection and with a WiFi connection; receiving, by the second POS device, a second input of a second customer order associated with the transaction while the first POS device and the second POS device are in an offline mode with respect to one another in which the first POS device and the second POS device are out of WiFi range; updating, by the second POS device and based at least in part on the second input, the copy of the open ticket and the associated versioning data structure to generate an updated copy of the open ticket and an updated copy of the associated versioning data structure while the first POS device and second POS device are in the offline mode with respect to one another; based at least in part on the first POS device and the second POS device entering the online mode with respect to one another in which the first POS device and the second POS device are back in the WiFi range, automatically synchronizing the open ticket between the first POS device and the second POS device by:
receiving, by the first POS device from the second POS device, the updated copy of the open ticket and the updated copy of the associated versioning data structure;
determining, by the first POS device and based at least in part on the updated copy of the associated versioning data structure and the associated versioning data structure, to reconcile the open ticket with the updated copy of the open ticket; and
reconciling, by the first POS device and based at least in part on the determining, the open ticket with the updated copy of the open ticket to generate a reconciled open ticket;
sending, by the first POS device to a payment service via the cellular data connection, the reconciled open ticket; and sending, by the first POS device to the payment service via the cellular data connection, a request to process payment for a cost of the transaction between the merchant and the one or more customers, and wherein the sending of the request to process the payment for the cost of the transaction causes the payment service to process the payment for the cost of the transaction between the merchant and the one or more customers based at least in part on the reconciled open ticket.

2 . The one or more computer-readable media as recited in claim 1 , wherein the instructions program the one or more processors to further perform acts comprising:
receiving, by the first POS device, a third input of a third customer order associated the one or more customers prior to the first POS device and second POS device reconnecting; and updating, by the first POS device, the open ticket with the associated versioning data structure in the memory of the first POS device based on the third input, and wherein the reconciling comprises:
determining one or more items of the third customer order match one or more of the items of the second customer order;
requesting the merchant to provide fourth input regarding whether the one or more items of the third customer order are duplicate requests by the one or more customers for the one or more items of the second customer order; and
generating the reconciled open ticket based on the fourth input received from the merchant.

3 . The one or more computer-readable media as recited in claim 1 , wherein the instructions program the one or more processors to further perform acts comprising:
receiving, by the first POS device, a third input of a third customer order associated the one or more customers prior to the first POS device and second POS device reconnecting; and updating, by the first POS device, the open ticket with the associated versioning data structure in the memory of the first POS device based on the third input, and wherein the reconciling comprises:
determining one or more items of the third customer order do not match one or more items of the second customer order;
generating the reconciled open ticket such that the reconciled open ticket includes at least the one or more items of the second order and the one or more items of the third order that do not match.

4 . The one or more computer-readable media as recited in claim 1 , wherein the instructions program the one or more processors to further perform acts comprising:
determining that the open ticket in the memory of the first POS device is an ancestor of the updated copy of the open ticket received from the second POS device based on the associated versioning data structure in the memory of the first POS device and the updated copy of the associated versioning data structure received from the second POS device; and wherein the reconciling is based on at least the determination that the open ticket in the memory of the first POS device is an ancestor of the updated copy of the open ticket received from the second POS device.

5 . The one or more computer-readable media as recited in claim 1 , wherein the instructions program the one or more processors to further perform acts comprising:
receiving, by the first POS device, a third input of a third customer order associated the one or more customers prior to the first POS device and second POS device reconnecting; updating, by the first POS device, the open ticket with the associated versioning data structure in the memory of the first POS device based on the third input, and determining that the open ticket in the memory of the first POS device and the updated copy of the open ticket received from the second POS device are concurrent versions based on the associated versioning data structure in the memory of the first POS device and the updated copy of the associated versioning data structure received from the second POS device; and wherein the reconciling is based at least on the determination that the open ticket in the memory of the first POS device and the updated copy of the open ticket received from the second POS device are concurrent versions.

6 . One or more non-transitory computer-readable media storing instructions executable by one or more processors, wherein the instructions program the one or more processors to implement a service to perform acts comprising:
receiving a first version of an open ticket associated with a transaction between a merchant and one or more customers from a first point-of-sale (POS) device of a plurality of POS devices of the merchant, the first version of the open ticket including one or more first items requested by the one or more customers from the merchant, the first version of the open ticket having an associated first vector; generating, by the service, a second version of the open ticket based at least in part on the first version of the open ticket such that the one or more first items are included in the second version of the open ticket, the second version of the open ticket having the associated first vector; based at least in part on a second POS device of the plurality of POS devices of the merchant switch

Assignees

• Square Inc

Inventors

• Renke Christopher Philip
• White Michael Wells
• Muller Eric Dickeson
• Wilson Mathew

Classifications

• G06Q30/0635

  replenishment orders; recurring orders · CPC title

• G06Q20/202 Primary

  Interconnection or interaction of plural electronic cash registers [ECR] or to host computer, e.g. network details, transfer of information from host to ECR or from ECR to ECR · CPC title

• G06Q20/20

  Point-of-sale [POS] network systems · CPC title

• G06F16/1734

  Details of monitoring file system events, e.g. by the use of hooks, filter drivers, logs · CPC title

• G06F16/178

  Techniques for file synchronisation in file systems · CPC title