Patent ID: 7577598

Claim:
A system for facilitating the opening of an account for a customer if an account activation system is unavailable, said account opening system comprising: a customer query system configured to prompt the customer to submit customer information and an account opening request if the account activation system is unavailable, said query system further configured to record the submitted customer information and account opening request; a pre-validation system configured to receive the customer information from the customer query system and to validate that the customer information is sufficiently correct to allow activation of the account; an account number distribution system configured to allocate and distribute an account number identifying the account if the account activation system is unavailable in response to validation of the customer information; a cache system capable of receiving and storing the account opening request, the account number and the validated customer information if the account activation system is unavailable and further capable sending the account opening request, the account number and the validated customer information to the account activation system if the account activation system is available; and a monitor system that is configured to determine if the account activation system is available and is capable of communicating with the cache system.