Patent ID: 7809619

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for securing payments of a corporation, comprising the steps of: receiving a primary certificate, over a computer network, from a financial services provider (FSP); assigning, using a computer, the primary certificate to a primary certificate holder of the corporation, the primary certificate authorizing the primary certificate holder to designate a plurality of holders of secondary digital certificates that are derivative from the primary digital certificate, each of the primary and plurality of secondary certificates including unique identifying information and an indication of an authority of the holder of the certificate, the indication of authority including a maximum payment that the holder of the certificate is authorized to validate and an identification of payees for whom the certificate holder is authorized to validate payments; periodically accessing, over the computer network, a pending payment statement generated by the FSP upon presentation of the primary or one of the secondary certificates and successful authentication by the FSP, the pending payment statement including at least one pending payment request of the corporation collected by the FSP; matching, using the computer, each of the at least one pending corporate payment requests against a record of a corresponding entry in an accounting system of the corporation; validating, using a computer, only those corporate payment requests having corresponding entries in the accounting system, that are within the maximum payment and for the identified payees included in the presented and authenticated certificate, a validation of each collected pending payment request by an authenticated certificate holder being a condition precedent to the payment request clearing an account of the corporation at the FSP.