Incremented, progressive awarding and presentation of loyalty program awards

Abstract

This invention is about methods and systems for utilizing trip (flight, train, ferry) data and time at which trip milestones occur to automatically create an incremental, spread-out, progressive earning plan for any of the award amounts that a travel loyalty program's member is entitled to, to employ the incremental earning plan to automatically insert the earnings according to the incremental earning plan to the member's account or to automatically trigger their insertion, to allow visual tracking of the plan through a user interface and to present additional miles in the same incremental fashion in case of delays.

Description

[0001] INCREMENTED, PROGRESSIVE AWARDING AND PRESENTATION OF LOYALTY PROGRAM AWARDS

[0002] Technical Field

[0003] This invention is about methods and systems for utilizing trip (flight, train, ferry) data and time at which trip milestones occur to automatically create an incremental, spread-out, progressive earning plan for any of the award amounts that a travel loyalty program’s member is entitled to, to employ the incremental earning plan to automatically insert the earnings according to the incremental earning plan to the member’s account or to automatically trigger their insertion, to allow visual tracking of the plan through a user interface and to present additional miles in the same incremental fashion in case of delays.

[0004] Background

[0005] A travel loyalty program, or a frequent flyer program (FFP) as referred to in commercial aviation, is a rewards program offered by travel-related businesses to incentivize and retain loyal customers. These programs are common among airlines, and sometimes railways and ferry / cruise lines. In commercial aviation, the earliest loyalty programs date back to early 1980’s.

[0006] Loyalty Management Systems (LMS) are systems that enable travel loyalty programs to administer their program in order to allow the members of the public to register as members, manage their program account, have an account balance consisting of various program currencies, earn and spend award currencies that are usually named ‘miles’ or ‘points’, participate in program promotions or campaigns, earn status currencies that are usually named ‘status miles’ or ‘status points’ and count towards a card level with the program such as ‘Blue’, ‘Silver’, ‘Gold’. Passenger Service Systems (PSS) or Passenger Reservations Systems (PRS) are a collection of systems which work together to track inventory, accept and manage reservations, issue and manage tickets, manage and track revenue, manage schedules, allocate seats and manage the boarding of passengers to flights, trains or ferries / cruises.

[0007] For award currencies given to a loyalty program member because of travel on an award- eligible trip, triggered messages from PSS or PRS reach LMS. LMS, after validation, adds award currencies and / or status currencies to the member’s account balance in their entirety at once. Earnings are then usually communicated to the member via an email. Some PSS systems can display amounts to be earned to the passengers for informative purposes during search, reservation, ticketing or check-in steps, but again, in their entirety.

[0008] The abstract of patent US2005267800A1 “METHOD, SYSTEM AND COMPUTER PROGRAM FOR PROVIDING A LOYALTY ENGINE ENABLING DYNAMIC ADMINISTRATION OF LOYALTY PROGRAMS” states “A method, computer system, and computer program product for encouraging customer loyalty is provided. The method includes the steps of: (1) one or more members defining a loyalty program, the loyalty program defining loyalty reward points associated with one or more activities; (2) registering one or more participants with the loyalty program, whereby their registration includes the provision of financial card data for one or more financial cards of each of the one or more participants; (3) collecting financial data corresponding to transactions of the one or more participants associated with the one or more members, and providing said financial data to a loyalty engine; (4) providing access to the loyalty engine to the one or more members, the loyalty engine permitting the one or more members: (a) to define the rules defining the loyalty program, including accumulation of loyalty reward points, and redemption of loyalty reward points; (b) monitoring the effectiveness of the loyalty program; and (c) modifying the loyalty program to enhance its effectiveness. The computer system includes the loyalty engine of the invention. The computer program product consists of a server application that includes the loyalty engine of the invention. Members access a number of software utilities linked to the loyalty engine to assess the effectiveness of the loyalty programs and customize the attributes of the loyalty programs on the fly to improve effectiveness. Participants access the loyalty engine to access a virtual real time loyalty reward point account, and redeem loyalty reward points for prizes”. The patent refers to a easily accessible program that loyalty program members can reach.

[0009] The abstract of patent US2010145786A1 “LOYALTY PROGRAM SERVICE” states “A loyalty program for a transaction processing system includes a loyalty program database with loyalty program business rules that are usable to determine when a transaction qualifies for the loyalty program. A loyalty program rule implementer receives transaction data whenever a transaction occurs and uses the received transaction data and the program business rules to determine when a transaction qualifies for the loyalty program. The loyalty program rule implementer is an entity other than an issuer, an acquirer or a merchant. The loyalty program business rules require that the transaction relate to at least one of a specific merchant, a specific issuer, a specific acquirer, a specific consumer, a specific product / service, a consumer having a specific characteristic, a merchant having a specific characteristic, an issuer having a specific characteristic, an acquirer having a specific characteristic and a product / service having a specific characteristic”. The patent describes a method with regards to the transaction details of a loyalty program.

[0010] Explanation of the Invention

[0011] This invention is about methods and systems for utilizing trip (flight, train, ferry) data and time at which trip milestones occur to automatically create an incremental, spread-out, progressive earning plan for any of the award amounts that a travel loyalty program’s member is entitled to, to employ the incremental earning plan to automatically insert the earnings according to the incremental earning plan to the member’s account or to automatically trigger their insertion, to allow visual tracking of the plan through a user interface and to present additional miles in the same incremental fashion in case of delays.

[0012] The goal of the invention is to automatically award the loyalty program members in small increments between two or more time-points related to their trip, to automatically trigger the insertion in small increments, to provide a user interface for the visual representation of the progressive incremental loyalty program earning and to provide a user interface in the in-flight entertainment system for the visual representation of the progressive incremental loyalty program earning.

[0013] Another goal of the invention is to provide a user interface for the visual representation of the progressive incremental loyalty program earning to the potential loyalty program members for informatory purposes, to provide a user interface in the in-flight entertainment system for the visual representation of the progressive incremental loyalty program earning to the potential loyalty program members for informatory purposes and to simulate the progressive incremental loyalty program earning and visually presenting the simulation to the passenger through a user interface.

[0014] Another goal of the invention is to utilize trip data and / or times at which trip-related milestones of a passenger journey occur to approximate the loyalty program earnings to real time between two time-points.

[0015] Another goal of the invention is utilizing trip data and / or times at which trip-related milestones of a passenger journey occur to make, modify or cancel a spread-out, incremented, progressive earning plan for the loyalty program awards of the passenger; to automatically communicate the spread-out, incremented, progressive award earning plan for the loyalty program member on a flight, train or ship, or scheduled to take the flight, train or ship; and to automatically communicate changes of the spread-out, incremented, progressive award earning plan for the loyalty program member on a flight, train or ship, or scheduled to take the flight, train or ship.

[0016] A different goal of the invention is to utilize trip data to calculate an extra incremental, progressive loyalty program award earning to be given in relation to the delay duration of a trip; to utilize trip data and / or times at which trip-related milestones of a passenger journey occur to make, modify or cancel a spread-out, incremented, progressive earning plan for the loyalty program awards of the passenger with regards to the delay duration of the trip; to automatically insert awards to the accounts of the loyalty program members while their delayed trip is still in progress; to automatically communicate the spread-out, incremented progressive loyalty program award earning plan related to the trip delay duration; to provide a user interface for the visual representation of the spread-out, incremented progressive loyalty program award earning plan related to the trip delay duration; and to provide a user interface in the in-flight entertainment system for the visual representation of the spread-out, incremented progressive loyalty program award earning plan related to the trip delay duration

[0017] Figures

[0018] In accordance with the contents of the above sections and elaborations below, the contents of the drawings are for illustrative purposes only and illustrate only some examples and / or embodiments of the invention. These drawings are provided to facilitate the reader's understanding of the invention and are not to be interpreted as limiting the scope and applicability of the invention. It should be noted that for clarity and ease of drawing, these drawings are not to scale.

[0019] Figure 1: Steps of the automated process regarding the spread-out, incremented earning plan.

[0020] Figure 2: Depiction of the visual user interface.

[0021] Figure 3: Depiction of the screen for the parameters that authorized administrators can configure in the system.

[0022] Explanation of the References in the Figures

[0023] 101 The step of collecting data to create the spread-out, incremented earning plan,

[0024] 102 The step of creating the spread-out, incremented earning plan automatically with the collected information,

[0025] 103 The step of automatically depositing -or triggering the deposition of- miles into the member's account according to the spread-out, incremented earning plan,

[0026] 104 The step of presenting the spread-out, incremented earning plan with a visual user interface, 105 The step of transmitting the spread-out, incremented earning plan to other systems in a machine-readable format.

[0027] Detailed Explanation of the Invention

[0028] The method of the invention has a system where loyalty program members receive the points or miles they are entitled to in real-time, in increments during their trip, instead of receiving them before or after the trip. This process, which can be tracked by members, is based on the principle of motivating the member through real-time earning and its tracking.

[0029] Methods and systems to utilize the below data to award and / or allow the tracking of the award currencies that a loyalty program member or a potential member is entitled to for a particular trip (flight, train, ferry), in order to automatically spread and incrementally award and / or allow incremental tracking between two time points of the journey.

[0030] • Times when trip milestones occur and / or are planned to occur, such as the beginning of the check-in period, the end of the check-in period, the beginning of the flight / train / ferry boarding period, the end of the boarding period, the flight departure and landing time;

[0031] • Times when the milestones of the trip are carried out by the passenger (such as the passenger checking in, the passenger boarding the plane);

[0032] • Passenger's loyalty program data.

[0033] For example, a flight between airports 'A' and 'B' departs from airport 'A' at 18:00 and lands at airport 'B' at 19:40. Amember of the airline loyalty program is on the flight and is eligible to earn 1000 miles (points) of program award currency. Instead of the member receiving the entire 1,000-mile award at once before or after the flight, the system automatically spreads the miles earned on this trip between two journey milestones (actual departure time, actual landing time) at 18:00 and 19:40 for a gradual awarding experience during the flight. Members can track their earnings during their journey through a visual user interface such as a progress bar and / or increasing counter. This creates real-time awarding and / or the feeling of real-time awarding. Figure 1: Steps of the automated process involved in creation of the spread-out, incremented earning plan. The step of collecting data to create the spread-out, incremented earning plan (101), the step of creating the spread-out, incremented earning plan automatically with the collected information (102), the step of automatically depositing -or triggering the deposition of- miles into the member's account according to the spread-out, incremented earning plan (103), the step of presenting the spread-out, incremented earning plan with a visual user interface (104), the step of transmitting the spread-out, incremented earning plan to other systems in a machine-readable format (105).

[0034] The incremented earning visual interface serves as a tool to attract members' attention, and offers, advertisements and / or the ability to share it with other people can be added to the visual interface.

[0035] Figure 2: Depiction of the visual user interface.

[0036] The visual element can also work only for the purpose of linking the earnings to real time and informing them in advance, even if the award amounts are not deposited into the members’ accounts immediately and deposited into their accounts at another time.

[0037] The authorized system user can parametrically select different milestones for the distribution of points. For example, let's say that the parameters selected by the authorized system user in advance will be such that the distribution operations will be between the time the members check in for the flight and the time the flight lands. A member checks in at 09:00 in the morning for an 18:00 flight. In this case, the system may automatically spread the miles (points) to be given to this member between 09.00 in the morning and the landing time.

[0038] Not all scheduled trips, like flights, start or land at the scheduled times. The system can calculate additional points in case of delays and create a spread-out, incremented earning plan of these points in line with the parameters chosen by authorized users. For example, a flight scheduled to land at 19.40, the plane lands at 20.40 instead of the planned landing time at 19.40. Between these two milestones (scheduld landing time and actual landing time), additional earnings for compensation purposes may automatically be presented to the member in the form of a spread-out, incremental earnings plan.

[0039] Figure 3: Depiction of the screen for the parameters that authorized administrators can configure in the system.

[0040] The contents of the System Admin Configuration (parameter selection) screen of the method in the invention are as follows:

[0041] 1. Divide earnings between the below milestones: a. Start Milestone:

[0042] • Check-in opens.

[0043] • Member checks-in.

[0044] • Check-in closes.

[0045] • Boarding starts.

[0046] • Member boards the flight.

[0047] • Boarding ends.

[0048] • Scheduled take-off time.

[0049] • Actual take-off time. b. End milestone:

[0050] • Scheduled landing time.

[0051] • Actual landing time.

[0052] 2. Additional Settings

[0053] • Send email to members for visual earning display

[0054] • Send SMS to members for visual earning display

[0055] • Send push notification to members for visual earning display

[0056] • Send email to other passengers for visual earning display

[0057] • Send SMS to other passengers for visual earning display

[0058] • Send push notification to other passengers for visual earning display

[0059] 3. Award extra earnings for delayed flights: a. Award to members b. Award to other passengers c. Choose award currency

[0060] • Award miles,

[0061] • Status miles,

[0062] • Other. d. Rate of awarding, e. Ignore delay under (... min),

[0063] 4. Other additional settings:

[0064] • Send email to members for visual earning display

[0065] • Send SMS to members for visual earning display

[0066] • Send push notification to members for visual earning display

[0067] • Send email to other passengers for visual earning display

[0068] • Send SMS to other passengers for visual earning display

[0069] • Send push notification to other passengers for visual earning display

[0070] Although for clarity and consistency purposes, the examples and discussed figures mainly refer to commercial aviation and airline loyalty program award earnings in the above sections “Explanation of the Invention” and “Detailed Explanation of the Invention”, the system can also work with the same principles in different travel loyalty programs.

Claims

CLAIMS1 . A computer implemented method comprising:- awarding loyalty program members their earnings for a trip in real-time in a spread-out fashion throughout their trip;- automatically awarding the loyalty program members in small increments between two or more time-points related to their trip;- automatically triggering the awarding of the loyalty program members in small increments between two or more time-points related to their trip;- providing a user interface for the visual representation of the progressive incremental loyalty program earning to the loyalty program members;- providing a user interface in the in-flight entertainment system for the visual representation of the progressive incremental loyalty program earning to the loyalty program members;- providing a user interface for the visual representation of the progressive incremental loyalty program earning to the potential loyalty program members for informatory purposes;- providing a user interface in the in-flight entertainment system for the visual representation of the progressive incremental loyalty program earning to the potential loyalty program members for informatory purposes;- simulating the progressive incremental loyalty program earning and visually presenting the simulation to the passenger through a user interface;- utilizing trip data and / or times at which trip-related milestones of a passenger journey occur to approximate the loyalty program earnings to real time between two time-points;- utilizing trip data and / or times at which trip-related milestones of a passenger journey occur to make, modify or cancel a spread-out, incremented, progressive earning plan for the loyalty program awards of the passenger;- automatically communicating the spread-out, incremented, progressive award earning plan for the loyalty program member on a flight, train or ship, or scheduled to take the flight, train or ship;- automatically communicating changes of the spread-out, incremented, progressive award earning plan for the loyalty program member on a flight, train or ship, or scheduled to take the flight, train or ship;- utilizing trip data to calculate an extra incremental, progressive loyalty program award earning to be given in relation to the delay duration of a trip;- utilizing trip data and / or times at which trip-related milestones of a passenger journey occur to make, modify or cancel a spread-out, incremented, progressive earning plan for the loyalty program awards of the passenger with regards to the delay duration of the trip;- automatically inserting awards to the accounts of the loyalty program members while their delayed trip is still in progress;- automatically communicating the spread-out, incremented progressive loyalty program award earning plan related to the trip delay duration;- providing a user interface for the visual representation of the spread-out, incremented progressive loyalty program award earning plan related to the trip delay duration;- providing a user interface in the in-flight entertainment system for the visual representation of the spread-out, incremented progressive loyalty program award earning plan related to the trip delay duration.

2. A system comprising a non-transitory computer readable medium with instructions encoded and processor(s) set to perform the operations described in Claim 1.

3. A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer-readable storage medium with computer program code, code when executed triggers processor(s) to perform the operations described in Claim 1.

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