Patent ID: 8763045

Claim:
A method for graphically providing a customer service feature in a television receiver that is one of a plurality of television receivers, wherein the television receiver is configured to present imagery on a display in response to viewer instructions received from a remote control, the method comprising: receiving, at the television receiver, a direct broadcast satellite signal that comprises broadcast television programming and billing information associated with each of the plurality of other television receivers, and wherein the direct broadcast satellite signal is simultaneously broadcast to each of the plurality of television receivers; extracting, by the television receiver, billing information associated with the television receiver from the received direct broadcast satellite signal that describes particular services previously delivered to the television receiver via the direct broadcast satellite signal; providing the imagery for output on the display, wherein the imagery comprises a plurality of tabs, each tab of the plurality of tabs comprising a plurality of tiles each describing a function performed by the television receiver, wherein a first one of the tiles corresponds to the customer service feature, wherein a second one of the tiles corresponds to an electronic programming guide feature, and wherein a third one of the tiles corresponds to search feature, and wherein each of the first, second, and third tiles are displayed upon selecting either of a first tab of the plurality of tabs or a second tab of the plurality of tabs; receiving an input from the remote control that indicates a selection of one of the tiles; and if the customer service feature tile is selected, in response to the received input: providing the customer service feature associated with the selected tile from the television receiver by displaying further imagery comprising a further plurality of tiles, wherein one of the further plurality of tiles corresponds to the billing information associated with the television receiver extracted from the direct broadcast satellite signal, and wherein another one of the further plurality of tiles corresponds to a listing of currently-subscribed services, receiving a second input from the remote control that authorizes a payment of a bill for the particular services delivered to the television receiver, and providing payment information from the television receiver to a remote server via a connection separate from the direct broadcast satellite signal to thereby resolve the bill for the particular services delivered to the television receiver via the direct broadcast satellite signal.