Patent ID: 11941956
Assignee: TELLERMATE LIMITED
Field: Control (Instruments)
Classification: CPC G | IPC G

Claim 0:
1. A cash management system, the cash management system comprising a management terminal, a plurality of Electronic Point of Sale (EPOS) terminals and at least one intelligent cash holding unit; the at least one intelligent cash holding unit comprising a receiver operable to receive a signal comprising an identifier associated with a user, an access module operable, in response to the received signal, to allow access to the at least one cash holding unit, a counter which increments each time access is allowed to provide a sequence number identifying a transaction at the at least one cash holding unit, and a controller operable, in response to the received signal, to allow access to the at least one intelligent cash holding unit, wherein the controller is further operable to send a report comprising an identifier relating to the user to the management terminal; wherein the at least one intelligent cash holding unit comprises a cash counting apparatus;
wherein the report comprises data relating to the contents of the at least one intelligent cash holding unit and the sequence number identifying the transaction;
wherein each EPOS terminal is operable to calculate an amount owed based on inputs and operable to output the amount owed to the management terminal together with an identifier identifying the user;
wherein there are a greater number of EPOS terminals than intelligent cash holding units, wherein the at least one intelligent cash holding unit acts as a virtual cash holding unit for more than one EPOS terminal; and
wherein the management terminal reconciles transactions carried out by a user of an EPOS terminal with cash transactions carried out by said user at a shared intelligent cash holding unit and wherein the management terminal is arranged to verify that all data packets sent from each intelligent cash holding unit have been received by checking that for each intelligent cash holding unit there are no gaps in the sequence numbers received from the respective intelligent cash holding unit, wherein if a missing data packet is identified, the management terminal is operable to send a request for certain particular data, identified by sequence number to the relevant intelligent cash holding unit.