Patent ID: 7856406

Claim:
A method for managing accounts payable, comprising: receiving at a third party a request for services from a customer, the request for services specifying a spend limit for a requested service; providing functionality for a vendor to request from the customer an increase in the spend limit through message exchanges via the third party; receiving at the third party an invoice from the vendor, the invoice including an invoiced dollar amount corresponding to the spend limit for the requested service and at least a portion of the requested service performed by the vendor; routing the invoice from the third party to a customer for approval of the portion of the requested service performed by the vendor; receiving at the third party instructions from the customer to initiate payment of at least a portion of the invoiced dollar amount based on the customer's approval of the portion of the requested service performed by the vendor; allocating at the third party the approved portion of the invoiced dollar amount to a virtual account associated with the vendor and maintained by the third party; receiving at the third party a request from the vendor to have at least a portion of the allocated dollar amount transferred from a deposit account maintained by the third party to a real account owned by the vendor; using a computer at the third party to initiate an electronic transfer of the requested portion of the allocated dollar amount from the deposit account maintained by the third party to the real account owned by the vendor; and de-allocating at the third party the transferred requested portion of the allocated dollar amount from the virtual account associated with the vendor and maintained by the third party.