AU2003208134A1 - Public telephone terminal and method for charging for vehicle parking using said terminal - Google Patents

Description

AUSTRALIA

Patents Act 1990 COMPLETE SPECIFICATION FOR A STANDARD PATENT

ORIGINAL

Applicant(s): SIEMENS, S.A.

Actual Inventor(s): Francisco IBANEZ PALOMEQUE Address for Service: PATENT ATTORNEY SERVICES 26 Ellingworth Parade Box Hill Victoria 3128 Australia Title: PUBLIC TELEPHONE TERMINAL AND METHOD FOR CHARGING FOR VEHICLE PARKING USING SAID TERMINAL Associated Provisional Applications: No(s).: The following statement is a full description of this invention, including the best method of performing it known to me/us:- PUBLIC TELEPHONE TERMINAL AND METHOD FOR CHARGING FOR VEHICLE PARKING USING SAID TERMINAL Field of the invention This invention describes an apparatus and method for making phone calls, e.g. for providing access to internet services and parking time for vehicles.

Background to the invention The parking meter is an apparatus, normally used in urban areas, to automatically control, by means of the payment of an established amount, the time that a vehicle remains parked in a given place.

They are expensive apparatus, that need an electrical power connection, because of which they require civil works, increasing the costs of infrastructures for parking meter installations in urban areas.

Since operation is by means of the payment of an established amount, these apparatus are required to have means for the user to make said payment. Usually the user faces the difficulty of not having the exact amount of coins, or of not having a shop nearby where the particular cards intended for such purpose can be acquired. The aforementioned difficulty is made even worse if different methods of payment for the parking meter are not available, which frequently occurs. It would be essential then to have parking meters that systematically incorporate different means of payment, by coins, chip cards, with magnetic band or another specific type of card.

It should also be added that this is equipment that requires continuous maintenance, both for collecting the takings and for checking the proper operation of the device. All of this entails high maintenance cost for the equipment.

In the context of cost reduction, these devices don't usually incorporate technologies developed for the prevention of fraud in payment. The immediate consequence is the fraudulent use of parking meters, both in payment by coins and by cards. The incorporation of robust means of payment, by which is meant card readers, coin entries, authenticators and takings holder, becomes necessary.

As a result of the difficulties described the profit margin decreases: fraudulent use reduces the takings, infrastructure costs are large, and the need to incorporate payment means and protection increases the price per device.

The applicant is unaware of any device or method that implements, in an integrated way, the services herein described. The patent EP 0 599 528 should be mentioned as being related, in which a device to supply electrical power, that can at the same time act as a parking meter, is described. The difficulties presented have previously been outlined.

The above description does not constitute an admission that the systems described are part of the common general knowledge in Australia.

Description of the invention The solution presented in this specification consists in developing a device that, being the equivalent of a public telephone terminal, incorporates the functionality necessary so that it can charge for the parking time for vehicles in a given area and issue the tickets required.

This solution is aimed at lessening the difficulties previously described for companies that own parking meters, and for the users, as is described below.

Existing public telephone terminals feature a very developed payment device technology, in order to avoid fraud occuring when payment is made.

In the telephone terminals flexibility in the manner of payment by the user is also guaranteed, since they allow payment by means of coins and cards.

They imply a new market for the operator, and for the parking meter companies an infrastructure cost much lower than at present, since advantage would be taken of the existing telephone terminal infrastructure.

The user obtains the advantage of a greater availability of devices to pay for vehidle parking, the possibility of payment by means of coins or cards, the possibility of cancellation of parking fines from the actual terminal, notification by a call of the defective operation of the terminal, as well as an integrated service (telephone and parking meter).

The present invention describes a device that can integrate the services of a public telephony terminal with the service that a parking meter can offer and that may allow, among other functions, the making of telephone calls, the computation and charging of parking time for a given vehicle, the issue of accrediting receipt for the parking time, the call or for any other information that is held in the memory of the terminal or of the central exchange to which it can be connected, the sending of statistics to a data centre, and the monitoring of these terminals by a control system in the central exchange.

For this purpose the terminal that is proposed preferably should first of all include all the basic means for making a prepaid call.

That is, means of payment using coins of a telephone terminal (coin entries, coin refunds, coin authentication, and takings holder) and using cards (card reader).

Mechanisms for printing/issue of tickets as well as electronics for detection of paper level and jamming must preferably be also incorporated.

Development of control software that allows: the user to choose the functionality of the terminal, as telephone or parking meter, the operator to be aware of the call data, takings, attempts at fraud, to control the programming parameters of their terminals, etc., has also been necessary for putting the innovation into practice.

It allows the parking meter companies to subcontract to the operator the services of installation, takings, repair and maintenance in a safe manner, of the parking of vehicles involved, with very little infrastructure cost.

In addition it is anticipated that these terminals, like the existing telephone terminals, be connected to a central exchange for control and monitoring so that call statistics, statistics concerned with the parking charge, operational incidents in both telephone and parking meter modes, may be sent. For this electronics and a communication protocol for carrying out communications would be incorporated.

From the control and operation central exchange the telephones may be able to be remotely personalized, both individually and in groups. This system of the central exchange will offer functions characteristic of an infrastructure operation centre: Infrastructure management (location, administrative Terminal maintenance(alarms, repairs,...).

Configuration of operational parameters (rates, numeration Management of statistical information of each terminal (number and type of calls, payment means used, takings).

Generation of reports.

Remote loading of application programs.

Description of the drawings To supplement this description and with the aim of leading to a better understanding of the characteristics of the assembly described, as an integral part of this description it is accompanied by a set of drawings where in an illustrative and non-limiting way, the following have been represented: Figure 1. Shows schematically the basic components of the terminal developed: electronic control units, means of payment (card reader, coin entries, coin holder, authenticator and refund receptacle), keyboard, display, supply unit, modem, printer and optionally, other security modules.

Figure 2. Schematically shows the connection between multiple terminals and the control and monitoring system. Different terminals connected through different telephony networks to the system server are shown. Several servers that would control different geographical areas are shown in the figure. Client applications, also shown, would access said servers for data consultation. The connection of the parking meter service provider, that could access the telephone operator's data, is shown as an option.

Preferable embodiment of the invention In a preferable embodiment of the invention, the terminal that is proposed consists of, among others, the following basic elements shown in Figure 1.

Coin entry devices coin outlet devices and coin authentication This will allow any user to make a payment for the services previously described, using coins, that are validated inside the terminal and that once the service has been provided, will be accepted (pass to the takings holder or those that exceed the amount chargeable will be returned through the coin outlet device consistent of a refund coin receptacle. These three devices can be of the type normally used in public telephones or machines that are operated by coins, cards or similar.

Card entry device usually called card readers whose technology is widely known in public telephony and that allows the charging of services using different types of cards (such as bank cards or telephone cards for example).

Devices for the printing and issuing of tickets that, for example, store information relating to the call made by the user or to the parking of said user's vehicle.

Connection by telephone line between the terminal and a monitoring and control central exchange, on which the terminals of a given geographical area will depend.

External characteristic elements of a public telephone terminal such as a dialling pad handset display screen hook and buzzer In addition a non-numeric keyboard is included through which the user can select the mode in which the terminal (telephone or parking meter) will operate, as well as choose the time period that his vehicle will remain parked, the type of information that he wants to appear in the tickets, etc.

Electronic control unit in turn comprising of a logic electronic unit (13) and an analogue electronic unit that includes a microprocessor, a memory unit, a modem and a supply unit. The microprocessor will execute the control of all the events (both those arising from the line, and those that are due to the intervention of the user).

The memory unit will store all the parameters that the terminal might need in its programming, such as, for example, rates for local and national calls, parking time rates, etc.

By means of the modem (12) the terminal will be able to exchange information with the monitoring and control central exchange, so that it will be possible to carry out certain controls remotely from said central exchange, such as, for example, the downloading of new rates or the putting out of service. The modem (12) will, in turn, allow the sending of all types of statistical data, about calls, takings, data about vehicle parking, etc. from the terminal to the central exchange.

The terminal can also be optionally fitted with an ALT (Anti Line Tampering) line protection device (14).

With these basic elements, when a user wants to use one of the terminals that are presented herein, he will have to first select the operation mode, using the keyboard In the case that he wants to make a call, the procedure is identical to that which is followed at present in public telephones, unhook the handset, introduce a given amount (in coins or using a card) and dial the number with which he wants to connect.

In the case that the user chooses the parking meter mode of operation he will have to select the parking time that he requires. After that, he will again introduce the amount, in coins or by using a card, that will be acknowledged by the terminal in the same way in that the making of calls is acknowledged.

The terminal will guarantee the setting of the time of its internal clock with a daily communication with the central exchange. That allows the issue of the payment receipt to be placed in the parked vehicle. All the data of this transaction (amount, date, time and terminal identifier, card number and transaction identifier) will be stored in the terminal memory and finally will be transferred to the control system.

Another of the basic functionalities that have been included is that of cancellation of fines. When the parking time has expired the existing users have time in which they can effect payment of the fine and thus obtain a discount in the amount concerned. In this case, appropriate programming allows the user to pay the fine in any of these terminals installed in the public thoroughfare, without the need of going to any particular shop.

When used in this specification and claims, the terms "comprises" and "comprising" and variations thereof mean that the specified features, steps or integers are included. The terms are not to be interpreted to exclude the presence of other features, steps or components.

Claims (11)

1. Public telephone terminal for charging for vehicle parking, characterised in that it includes: means for making prepaid telephone calls, means of payment reception by coins or by cards, means of calculation of time to be charged for parking spaces, means of issuing an accrediting receipt for the payment made, means that allow a user to choose the terminal functionality to make a call or to request parking time, means to convert the amount paid by the user into call time or into parking time, means for communication with a central exchange that controls and supervises the terminals.

2. Terminal according to claim 1, characterised in that it has a frame that includes all the means indicated in the first claim, and is installed in areas intended for vehicle parking.

3. Terminal according to claim 1 or 2, characterised in that it includes means of connection to a central exchange for sending statistical data about calls and about parking, as well as the necessary data for the concession holder company, for reimbursement for services.

4. Terminal according to claim 1, 2 or 3 characterised in that it includes means of detection and control of fraud in calls and in the making of payment.

Method for charging for vehicle parking using the public telephone terminal described in the any one of claims 1 to 4, characterised in that it has: the reception of the user's initial payment for a communication service or parking payment service, the conversion of the user's initial payment into an equivalent call time, internet connection, or an equivalent parking time, the issuing of an accrediting receipt for the payment made and time used.

6. Method for the charging for vehicle parking according to the claim 5, characterised in that, using the terminal keyboard, the user initially selects the type of service that he wants to obtain from it, whether it be call time, Internet connection time, or parking time.

7. Method for the charging for vehicle parking, according to the claim 5 or 6, characterised in that the terminal communicates once daily with a control central exchange with the aim of guaranteeing the setting of the time of its internal clock for charging and for sending statistics and data necessary for the concession holder for the reimbursement of services.

8. Method for the charging for vehicle parking, according to the claim 5, 6 or 7, characterised in that, once the transaction has been completed, the terminal stores all the data relating to it in its internal memory, such as amount, date and time, terminal identifier, card number and for identifying the transaction, and it transfers them to the control central exchange.

9. Method for the charging for vehicle parking, according to the claim 5, 6, 7 or 8, characterised in that the terminal is capable of receiving the user's payment for fines for having exceeded the parking period previously paid for.

Public telephone terminal substantially as herein before described with particular reference to the accompanying drawings.

11. Method as claimed in claim 5 and substantially as herein before described with particular reference to the accompanying drawings. Dated this 3rd day of July 2003 PATENT ATTORNEY SERVICES Attorneys for SIEMENS, S.A.