Patent ID: 8374962

Claim:
A method for automatically processing an incoming payment for a payee with an online money transfer system, the method comprising steps of: receiving information at the online money transfer system, wherein the information relates to processing of one or more received payments associated with at least two payees, wherein the information relates to two or more different rules, wherein each of the two or more different rules relate to a different one of the payees, and wherein each of the two or more different rules define routing for incoming payments to a payee based on occurrence of a trigger condition and include at least a first rule comprising an earmark rule relating to one of the two payees and a second different rule comprising an escrow rule relating to a different one of the two payees; receiving the incoming payment associated with the payee; determining a default repository for the incoming payment; determining a priority for two or more different rules for two or more payments; determining an order for the two or more different rules, the order based on the priority; applying the two or more different rules in serial fashion based on the order; transferring a first portion of the incoming payment as an earmark away from the default repository according to the first rule and the order; holding a second portion of the incoming payment in escrow for benefit of at least one predetermined party according to the second rule and the order, wherein the escrowed second portion of the incoming payment is accessible by the at least one predetermined party subject to a set of conditions; and determining if one of the two or more different rules has expired due to a temporal event.