Patent ID: 7565307

Claim:
A system for conducting cashless business transactions, comprising: a plurality of fuel dispensers, each dispenser having at least one antenna and at least one vehicle presence detector, said at least one vehicle presence detector determining presence of a stationary vehicle by: (i) setting a stationary vehicle timer, (ii) detecting the vehicle while said timer is running, (iii) determining whether the timer has exceeded a predetermined threshold while the vehicle is detected, and (iv) if the threshold has been exceeded, determining that the vehicle is stationary; a controller having a tag reader for reading information from a tag connected to the vehicle when the vehicle is detected by said at least one vehicle presence detector, the controller receiving information by: (i) attempting to read the tag of the stationary vehicle, (ii) setting a tag read timer, (iii) determining whether a wait time for the tag reader has been exceeded, (iv) if the wait time for the tag reader has not been exceeded, determining the tag reader was able to read the tag, (v) determining whether the number of readings of the tag has exceeded a predetermined threshold, (vi) if the threshold has been exceeded, determining whether the tag is a valid tag, (vii) extracting data from the tag; and a point of sale computer receiving tag information from the controller and processing the tag information to conduct a cashless business transaction.