Patent ID: 7043451

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for processing purchase card transactions submitted by a plurality of merchants, wherein each of the plurality of merchants is associated with one of a plurality of acquirers, the method comprising: defining, in a card product database, a master card product list including a plurality of card types, each card type corresponding to a group of purchase cards and having associated therewith a set of merchant-independent transaction processing parameter values for the group of purchase cards; for each of the plurality of acquirers, defining, in the card product database, an acquirer-level card product list, each acquirer-level card product list including a subset of the plurality of card types; for each of the plurality of merchants: associating, in a merchant database, the merchant with at least one of the card types included in the acquirer-level card product list of the associated acquirer; and for each card type associated with the merchant, setting values in the merchant database for a set of merchant-specific transaction processing parameters; and for each purchase card transaction submitted by one of the plurality of merchants: identifying, at a host computer communicably coupled to the merchant database, a card type for the purchase card used in the purchase card transaction from the at least one card type associated with the merchant; and using the merchant-specific transaction processing parameter values and the merchant-independent transaction processing parameter values associated with the identified card type to control processing of the purchase card transaction by the host computer.