Patent ID: 8237946

Claim:
A method for maintaining imaging device (IDev) accounting data in the event of a primary accounting server failure, said method comprising: listing a regional lightweight accounting back-up server (LABS) on an LABS list accessible to a plurality of IDevs within a geographical region, wherein said LABS is an application running on a network computing device, said LABS maintaining a financial accounting record of jobs performed by users of said IDevs with user accounts when a primary accounting server (PAS) is unavailableto said IDevs and wherein said LABS list consists of a listing of addresses for a plurality of network devices with LABS capability available only to said plurality of IDevs within said geographical region; monitoring a network for IDev availability requests from said LABS; receiving an availability request at said LABS from one of said IDevs whose PAS has become unavailable; responding to said request by sending an availability confirmation to said one of said IDevs; receiving IDev activity data from said one of said IDevs; and maintaining a temporary IDev activity log(TIAL) comprising said IDev activity data wherein said TIAL comprises a financial accounting record of jobs performed by users of said one of said IDevs with user accounts.