Method for diagnosis of failure and provision of information on ATM maintenance
The method addresses recurring ATM failures by identifying and repairing both the failed module and its cause using sensor data analysis, improving maintenance efficiency and reducing repeat visits.
Patent Information
- Authority / Receiving Office
- RU · RU
- Patent Type
- Patents
- Current Assignee / Owner
- HYOSUNG TNS INC
- Filing Date
- 2024-06-27
- Publication Date
- 2026-07-09
AI Technical Summary
Existing ATM maintenance methods fail to address the underlying cause of failures, leading to recurring issues and reduced efficiency due to frequent repairs, as technicians only fix the module with the failure without identifying and addressing the root cause.
A method that diagnoses failures in ATMs by analyzing sensor data from multiple nodes along the media return path, predicting the module causing the failure, and providing repair information to technicians to address both the failed module and its cause, using a maintenance server to guide repairs.
Prevents recurrence of failures by ensuring both the failed module and its cause are repaired, reducing the need for repeated visits and enhancing maintenance efficiency.
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Abstract
Description
[0001] Technical field
[0002] The present disclosure relates to a method for diagnosing a failure and providing repair information in an automated teller machine (ATM), and in particular, to a method for diagnosing a failure and providing repair information in an automated teller machine (ATM), which can effectively prevent the recurrence of a similar type of failure and improve the management efficiency of an automated teller machine (ATM) by helping technical personnel be able to repair the module providing the failure cause that caused the failure, together with the repair of the module where the failure occurred, in the process of recovery from the failure, since the node in which the abnormal sensor value was first measured is checked, based on the check, the module providing the failure cause that provided the cause of the abnormal operation that caused the failure and the information about the module where the failure actually occurred are predicted,and the information about the module providing the cause of the failure is provided to the service technician on site during the execution of the transactions in which the failure occurred, based on the sensor values measured by the various sensors included in the ATM when the failure occurs in the ATM.
[0003] Technology Level
[0004] The automated teller machine (ATM) is put into operation to support contactless financial transactions of financial institution customers, and performs various tasks such as depositing and withdrawing cash and checks, replenishing bank accounts, remitting money, and paying utility bills.
[0005] For this purpose, the ATM includes various modules such as display, scanner, printer and camera, and is designed so that various programs are installed on the CPU to control the display, scanner, printer and camera so as to make each module work smoothly.
[0006] Meanwhile, during a financial transaction through an ATM, the media is returned along the return route inside the machine. If a return failure occurs, for example, when banknotes are returned in a state in which they are tilted to one side (hereinafter referred to as "skew"), or when banknotes are returned with an excessively narrow gap between the media for various reasons, during the return and loading process, which is carried out at very high speeds, a media jam can often occur because the media in the return failure state gets stuck between the modules, or a failure, such as media damage, can occur.
[0007] When a failure occurs in the ATM, an appropriate automatic recovery attempt is made in accordance with the failure occurrence situation as described in Korean Patent No. 10-1093841, etc. If the failure is not resolved by such a self-recovery attempt in the machine, the machine stops the corresponding financial transactions, outputs failure information through the display unit of the ATM, that is, the customer display screen, the printer, and the employee display screen, which is included in the rear of the ATM, and supports the service technician who visits the financial institution where the machine is used to repair and maintain the machine, in order to repair the machine based on the failure information received from the ATM or the maintenance and repair server of the machine management organization, and notifies the financial institution and the maintenance and repair server of the fact of the failure occurrence and the failure information.
[0008] However, when an ATM malfunction occurs, the failure information provided by the service technician to support repair and maintenance of the machine typically only includes information about the module that caused the failure. Accordingly, the service technician simply repairs the module that caused the failure and resumes operation of the machine. In this case, if the financial transaction in which the failure occurred involves a module that provides the cause of the failure, the service technician will never take action against the module that provides the cause of the failure, since the failure information provided to the service technician does not include information about the module that provides the cause of the failure.
[0009] If a service technician repairs only the module that failed, without addressing the module that provides the cause of the failure, as described above, then, although the ATM resumes normal operation, the same and / or similar failure may reoccur repeatedly because the underlying cause of the failure has not been addressed. Consequently, the service life of the ATM is rapidly reduced due to frequent failures.
[0010] If only the module that has failed is repaired without fundamentally solving the problem of the module that provides the cause of the ATM failure as described above, a problem arises that the efficiency of ATM repair and maintenance is reduced because the service technician has to repeatedly visit the relevant machine to repair the relevant machine due to the machine failure that occurs again in the future.
[0011] Disclosure
[0012] Technical problem
[0013] The present disclosure was conceived to solve the technical problems, and more specifically, the purpose of the present disclosure is to provide a method for diagnosing a failure and providing repair information in an automated teller machine (ATM), which can effectively prevent the recurrence of a similar type of failure and improve the management efficiency of an ATM by helping a service technician be able to repair the module providing the failure cause that caused the failure, together with the repair of the module where the failure occurred, in the process of recovery from the failure, since the node in which the abnormal sensor value was first measured is checked, based on the check, the module providing the failure cause that provided the cause of the abnormal operation that caused the failure and the information about the module where the failure actually occurred are predicted,and the information about the module providing the cause of the failure is provided to the service technician on site during the execution of the transactions in which the failure occurred, based on the sensor values measured by the various sensors included in the ATM when the failure occurs in the ATM.
[0014] Technical solution
[0015] As a technological principle for achieving the object, the present disclosure provides a method for providing failure diagnosis results and repair information to a service technician on-site when a failure of an automated teller machine (ATM) occurs, including generating a failure code by identifying a module with the occurred failure in which the failure occurred in the ATM, checking the sensor values measured by multiple detection sensors provided in the respective nodes on the return route of the media with the occurred failure, in the process of the financial transaction in which the corresponding failure occurred, reading the sensor information of the node in which an abnormal sensor value outside a preset normal range was detected for the first time among the checked sensor values when the abnormal sensor value was detected, generating failure information including the failure code and the sensor information of the node,in which an abnormal sensor value was first detected and the generated fault information was provided to the service technician.
[0016] Positive effects
[0017] The method for diagnosing a failure and providing repair information in an ATM according to the present disclosure allows a service technician to be able to repair a module with a failed state and a module providing a failure cause that caused the failure, since the method is designed to predict the module providing a failure cause that caused the failure and provided a cause of abnormal operation by checking the node in which an abnormal sensor value was first measured, based on the sensor values measured by sensors included in the corresponding nodes in the ATM in which a failure occurred during financial transactions, and to provide the service technician on site with both information about the module with a failed state in which the failure actually occurred and information about the module providing a failure cause.Accordingly, this effectively prevents the recurrence of a similar type of failure, which reduces the frequency of service technician visits and increases the efficiency of ATM repair and maintenance.
[0018] Description of drawings
[0019] Fig. 1 is a diagram illustrating a display screen for a service technician that is provided when a failure occurs in a conventional ATM.
[0020] Fig. 2 is a diagram schematically reproducing the internal components of an ATM device to which an embodiment of the present disclosure is applied.
[0021] Fig. 3(a) and 3(b) are diagrams illustrating failure information and repair information that are provided by an ATM and / or a maintenance server to a service technician in a failure recovery process according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.
[0022] Fig. 4 is a diagram schematically illustrating a network environment for a system for diagnosing a failure and providing repair information in an ATM according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.
[0023] Fig. 5 is a flowchart for describing a process for diagnosing a failure of an ATM according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.
[0024] Best Mode
[0025] The present disclosure may be modified in various ways and may have various embodiments. Specific embodiments of the present disclosure are described in detail below with reference to the drawings, but the present disclosure is not limited to the following embodiments unless the present disclosure deviates from its subject matter.
[0026] Disclosure mode
[0027] Fig. 1 is a diagram illustrating a display screen for a service technician that is provided when a failure occurs in a conventional ATM.
[0028] As described above, when a failure occurs during a financial transaction, the general ATM displays the failure information of the machine through the ATM display unit and simultaneously notifies the financial server of the financial institution and the technical service server of the machine management organization of the fact of the failure after stopping the relevant financial transactions.
[0029] After receiving notification of a failure, the ATM's operating organization provides maintenance and repair services by dispatching a service technician to the installation site of the corresponding ATM. In this case, as shown in Fig. 1, the service technician arriving on-site to repair the ATM can check the failure code and type information associated with the failure that occurred in the corresponding ATM via the service technician display included in the ATM. Typically, the on-site service technician repairs the module with the failed ATM by connecting to the maintenance server via their portable terminal based on the information verified as described above and receiving repair information to resolve the corresponding failure.
[0030] That is, the service technician receives the repair process for the corresponding failure information from the maintenance server, transmits the failure information checked in the ATM to the maintenance server connected through its portable terminal, repairs the module in which the failure occurred according to the received repair process, and resumes the operation of the ATM in the normal mode.
[0031] However, if the ATM experiences the failure described above, the corresponding failure may be due to a defect in the module that caused the failure or an operational error. However, in many cases, the failure is also caused by an error in the previous module, where the failed media was processed before the corresponding module. In this case, the module that caused the failure and the module providing the failure reason are not the same, as the module providing the failure reason is separate.
[0032] Traditionally, a separate verification procedure to determine the module responsible for the failure is not performed. Consequently, the service technician never takes action on the module responsible for the failure, since the failure information provided to the service technician does not include information about the module responsible for the failure. If the service technician repairs only the module with the failed module without taking action on the module responsible for the failure, then, although the ATM resumes normal operation, there is a high probability that the root cause of the failure has not been eliminated. As a result, the same and / or similar failure types may recur repeatedly in the future.
[0033] If only the module that actually failed is repaired, without addressing the underlying module as described above, the service technician will have to repeatedly visit the affected device to repair it due to a subsequent failure. This leads to a reduction in the efficiency of device repair and maintenance.
[0034] To solve such a problem, the present disclosure provides a method for diagnosing a failure and providing repair information in an ATM by checking the values of various sensors provided on the corresponding route along the reverse flow of media in financial transactions in which a failure occurred when the failure occurred in the ATM, predicting the module providing the failure cause that caused the failure and provided the cause of the abnormal operation through a process of detecting a node in which the first abnormal sensor value was detected based on the checked sensor values, and providing to a service technician on-site both the information about the module with the failure that actually occurred, and the information about the module providing the failure cause. The detailed design of the method is described with reference to the following drawings.
[0035] Fig. 2 is a diagram schematically reproducing the internal components of the ATM device to which an embodiment of the present disclosure is applied. Fig. 3(a) and 3(b) are diagrams illustrating failure information and repair information that are provided by the ATM and / or the maintenance server to the service technician in the process of recovery from a failure in accordance with an embodiment of the present disclosure.
[0036] As shown in Fig. 2, a conventional automated teller machine 100 includes a cash deposit and withdrawal unit 110, a recognition unit 120, a reject drawer 130, a temporary payment unit 140, and a plurality of banknote cassettes 150a-150d. The devices are connected via a return path 160 for returning the media. On the return path, a plurality of gates Ga-Gg and a plurality of sensors Sa-Sg are provided, which detect the media passing through each module along the return path.
[0037] The process of diagnosing a failure and providing repair information by an ATM designed as described above is described as follows.
[0038] For example, during the process of depositing and accepting the media stored in the temporary payment unit 140 into the banknote cassettes 150a-150d after the media deposit and counting are normally completed, when the corresponding transactions are stopped due to the media jamming at a certain point A, the operating module Gc at the point where the failure occurred is provisionally considered as the module with the failure and is included in the failure information. The failure information is transmitted to the service technician.
[0039] However, during the occurrence of the corresponding failure, the cause of the corresponding failure may be an operating error in the Gc module that caused the failure, but it is also possible that the failure occurred due to an operating error in the previous module through which the carrier passed that caused the failure. For example, a failure could occur on the Gc gate due to an operating error in the Ga gate, since the carriers return with a narrowed return interval between carriers.
[0040] In this case, the service technician typically repairs only the Gc valve, as they are not provided with information about the Ga valve that caused the failure, but only the Gc valve where the failure actually occurred. As a result, the service technician will only repair the Gc valve, and even after repair, the faulty Ga valve may reoccur. Therefore, the likelihood of these types of failures recurring is very high.
[0041] In order to solve this problem, in the present disclosure, the above-mentioned deposit collection process is constructed in such a way as to check the node in which the first abnormal sensor value was detected by checking the values of the Sa-Sg sensors present in the return route in the section from the temporary payment unit in which the media is stored to the Gc gate in which the failure occurred, along the return flow of media according to the corresponding financial transactions.
[0042] That is, the values of all sensors installed on the return route along which the media is returned are checked for each financial transaction. In this case, each sensor can measure any or several values of the length, width, and thickness of the media returned along the return route, the skew, or the return interval between media.
[0043] In addition, to determine whether a sensor value corresponds to an abnormal sensor value, a normal range and an abnormal range are preset for each type of sensor value. These ranges correspond to the occurrence of an operating error, i.e., not a failure. An abnormal sensor value that is outside the normal range and corresponds to the abnormal range is detected.
[0044] That is, in the above embodiment, when an abnormal sensor value occurs for the first time in sensor Sb, there is a high probability that the operating error may have occurred in the module before sensor Sb. Accordingly, the sensor information of the node where the abnormal sensor value was first detected is also included in the failure information. This failure information is provided to service personnel.
[0045] Fig. 3(a) is a diagram illustrating the failure information provided through the display to an ATM worker during the failure recovery process according to an embodiment of the present disclosure. Fig. 3(b) is a diagram illustrating the repair information provided from the maintenance server to the service technician's portable terminal during the failure recovery process according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.
[0046] When it is verified that, as a result of checking the sensor values as described above, an abnormal sensor value has been detected in the sensor Sb for the first time, as shown in Fig. 3(a), the ATM to which the embodiment of the present disclosure is applied provides failure information to the service technician by including information of the sensor Sb by which the first abnormal sensor value was detected in the failure information together with information of the module with the occurred failure.
[0047] Furthermore, in this case, the ATM's failure information provided to the service technician may be transmitted via a display screen for the worker, or a QR code or barcode, etc., which includes the relevant failure information, may be provided to the service technician by displaying the QR code or barcode on the screen. As in Fig. 3(a), the relevant failure information may also be provided along with the QR code.
[0048] After this, the service technician who arrives at the site to repair the corresponding device enters the failure information displayed on the display for the worker of the device into a special application for troubleshooting installed on his portable terminal, or transmits the failure information to the maintenance server by entering the QR code or barcode information through his portable terminal connected to the maintenance server. The maintenance server predicts the module providing the failure cause by analyzing the received failure information and provides the service technician's portable terminal with repair information, including the recovery process for solving the module providing the failure cause, as shown in Fig. 3(b).
[0049] That is, the maintenance server predicts the module providing the failure cause based on the received failure code and the first abnormal sensor information, and provides repair information for restoring the module providing the failure cause to the service technician's portable terminal.
[0050] Through a series of information provision processes performed as described above, the service technician repairs both the module that has failed and the module that provides the failure cause based on the repair information received. This is described in more detail with reference to Figs. 4 and 5 below.
[0051] Fig. 4 is a diagram schematically illustrating a network environment for a system for diagnosing a failure and providing repair information in an ATM according to an embodiment of the present disclosure. Fig. 5 is a flowchart for describing a process for diagnosing a failure of an ATM according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.
[0052] As shown in Fig. 4, the system for diagnosing a failure and providing repair information in an ATM according to an embodiment of the present disclosure is configured to support a failure recovery process performed by a service technician by transmitting repair information, which is properly matched with the results of the failure diagnosis, to the portable terminal 300 of the service technician who has been dispatched to the site, through a series of processes by which the results of the failure diagnosis and repair information are output through network communication between the ATM 100 in which a failure has occurred and the maintenance server 200.
[0053] This is a more specific description. When an ATM 100 malfunctions, it terminates the corresponding financial transactions, displays the malfunction information via the display unit, and notifies the technical support server 200 of the machine's management organization of the malfunction. In response to the notification of the ATM's malfunction, the technical support server 200 of the machine's management organization dispatches a service technician to the ATM's location where the malfunction occurred. The service technician then arrives at the appropriate location via their portable terminal 300, notifying the technical support server 200 of their arrival and transmitting the malfunction information, which is displayed on the ATM's display for the ATM worker.
[0054] For this purpose, a special troubleshooting application is installed on the service technician's portable terminal. The portable terminal is designed to input fault information or display it in a form such as a QR code or barcode for easy recognition and transmission to the maintenance server.
[0055] The maintenance server 200 predicts the module providing the failure cause that caused the corresponding failure and provided the cause of the abnormal operation in connection with the node in which the first abnormal sensor value was detected by analyzing the received failure information, selects the failure repair information based on the information of the module with the occurred failure and the information of the module providing the failure cause, which are identified based on the received failure code and the first abnormal sensor information, and transmits the failure repair information to the portable terminal of the service technician.
[0056] To this end, the maintenance server is equipped with an algorithm that predicts the module providing the cause of failure based on abnormal sensor information, as well as various types of failures that may occur in the ATM. The maintenance server is designed to periodically update data on various failure types and associated sensor information, which is accumulated on the server.
[0057] At the same time, the service technician can repair both the module that failed and the module that provides the failure cause, based on the failure repair information transmitted by the maintenance server. Recurrence of a failure caused by the same cause in the same machine can be effectively prevented by the ATM's failure diagnosis and repair information reporting system, which is designed as described above.
[0058] In addition, when notifying the maintenance server of the occurrence of a failure, the ATM can transmit both the failure code and the information of the sensor that recorded the first abnormal sensor value.
[0059] Meanwhile, the ATM that experienced the failure performs a series of steps to provide failure information, including both the failure code and the first abnormal sensor information, as described above. The failure information verification process performed at the ATM is described below with reference to Fig. 5.
[0060] While financial transactions are being performed in the ATM 100 in response to a customer request, when a machine failure is detected (S400), the CPU of the ATM supports a service technician on-site to repair the machine module providing the cause of the failure, based on the failure information provided on the display screen for the ATM worker, by stopping the relevant financial transactions and checking the sensor information of each sensor that is stored in the memory, by tracing the return route of the media from the module where the failure occurred, in which a failure occurred in the corresponding transaction process (S500), reading the node in which the abnormal sensor value was first measured in the process of performing the relevant financial transactions, among the parts of the sensor information, (S600), and generating failure information including the sensor information of the node in which the abnormal sensor value was first measured, together with a failure code,associated with the module that has failed, and outputting information about the failure via the ATM display unit (S700).
[0061] For this purpose, according to the present disclosure, an abnormal range is preset in the ATM CPU to determine whether each sensor value measured by various sensors included in the ATM complies with the abnormal sensor value. In this case, the abnormal sensor value range exceeds the normal range, which is preset for each type of sensor value to a predetermined range, but is configured as an abnormal range that does not reach the failure range, but has the potential to cause an operational error, which is predetermined and set.
[0062] In this case, the sensor information stored in the memory for each transaction includes element sensor values such as the length, width, and thickness of the media, skew, and return interval between media, as well as sensor information such as the sensor location.
[0063] Meanwhile, if the occurrence of machine failure is not detected (S400), the ATM 100 continuously performs financial transactions.
[0064] It may be obvious to a person having ordinary knowledge in the technical field to which the present disclosure pertains that the present disclosure described above is not limited to the above-mentioned embodiments and the accompanying drawings and can be replaced, modified and changed in various ways without departing from the technical spirit of the present disclosure.
[0065] Industrial applicability
[0066] The method for diagnosing a failure and providing repair information in an automated teller machine (ATM) according to the present disclosure can prevent the occurrence of a similar type of failure by allowing a service technician to repair the module providing the failure cause that caused the failure, together with the repair of the module with the occurred failure in the process of recovery from the failure, and can improve the efficiency of managing and repairing the ATM by reducing the frequency of service technician visits, since the node in which the abnormal sensor value was first measured is checked, based on the check, the module providing the failure cause that provided the information on the cause of the abnormal operation that caused the failure is predicted, and the information on the module with the occurred failure in which the failure actually occurred and the information on the module providing the failure cause are provided to the service technician on-site based on the sensor values,measured by various sensors included in the ATM,
[0067] Description of positional designations
[0068] 100: ATM,
[0069] 110: Cash deposit and withdrawal unit,
[0070] 120: Recognition block,
[0071] 130: Reject box,
[0072] 140: temporary payment block,
[0073] 150: Banknote cassette,
[0074] 160: return route,
[0075] 200: Maintenance server,
[0076] 300: Portable terminal.
Claims
1. An automated teller machine (ATM) configured to: generate a failure code by identifying the module in which the failure occurred, where the failure occurs during operation of the ATM; checking the sensor values measured by several detection sensors installed in the corresponding nodes on the return route of the carrier where the failure occurred, during the financial transaction in which the corresponding failure occurred; generating fault information containing the sensor information of the node on which an abnormal sensor value outside the specified normal range was first detected among the tested sensor values, together with a fault code generated upon detection of the abnormal sensor value; and transferring the generated information about the failure to the ATM management organization or providing the generated information about the failure to a service specialist who goes to the site to fix the failure.
2. An ATM according to paragraph 1, wherein the ATM provides information about the failure to a service specialist via a display screen for an employee, which is included in the ATM.
3. The ATM according to paragraph 2, wherein the ATM provides information about the refusal by converting the information about the refusal into a QR code (quick response code) or a barcode.
4. A method for providing diagnostic results of a failure and repair information to a service technician on-site when an automated teller machine (ATM) failure occurs, said method comprising the steps of: generate a failure code by identifying the module that failed, in which the failure occurred in the ATM; check the sensor values measured by several detection sensors installed in the corresponding nodes on the return route of the carrier where the failure occurred, during the financial transaction in which the corresponding failure occurred; read the sensor information of the node on which an abnormal sensor value outside the specified normal range was first detected among the checked sensor values when the abnormal sensor value was detected; generate failure information containing the failure code and the sensor information of the node on which the abnormal sensor value was first detected; and provide the generated failure information to the service technician.
5. The method according to claim 4, wherein the normal sensor value range for the sensor values measured by the multiple detection sensors is pre-set and stored in the central processing unit (CPU) of the ATM and a sensor value that is outside the normal sensor value range among the sensor values checked in the financial transaction process in which the failure occurred when the failure occurred is determined as an abnormal sensor value when the sensor value is detected.
6. The method according to paragraph 4, in which the information about the refusal is provided via a display for an employee, which is included in the ATM.
7. The method according to claim 6, wherein the information about the refusal is provided by conversion into the form of a QR code (quick response code) or a barcode.
8. A system for repair and maintenance of automated teller machines (ATMs), comprising: several ATMs, each of which contains an ATM according to paragraph 1; and a control server connected to ATMs via a wired / wireless communication network, wherein the control server supports the module providing the reason for the failure, which provided the reason for the occurrence of the failure subject to repair and maintenance, together with the module with the occurred failure, in which the failure occurred during the repair and maintenance of the ATM, by receiving information about the failure of the ATM through a special application installed on the portable terminal of the service specialist, predicting the module providing the reason for the failure based on the sensor information of the node on which the abnormal value of the sensor was first detected, which is included in the received information about the failure, and transmitting the repair information containing information about the module with the occurred failure, which is identified based on the failure code and information about the predicted module providing the reason for the failure, to the portable terminal of the service specialist.
9. The ATM repair and maintenance system according to claim 8, wherein the algorithm predicting the module that provided the cause of the failure based on the type of failure and the sensor information of the node on which the abnormal sensor value was first detected is installed on the control server.
10. The ATM repair and maintenance system according to paragraph 9, in which the algorithm installed on the control server and the module predicting the cause of failure based on sensor information is periodically updated with data for each type of failure and sensor information associated with it, which are accumulated on the control server.
11. The ATM repair and maintenance system according to paragraph 8, in which the repair information contains a detailed repair process containing the location of the module where the failure occurred and providing the reason for the module failure.