Patent ID: 7567937

Claim:
A method for automatically effecting payment for a user of an electronic auction web site maintained by an electronic auction system, said method comprising the steps of: maintaining a plurality of electronic payment accounts by an electronic auction payment system integrated with said electronic auction system, each of said plurality of electronic payment accounts storing funds therein and each being used for user transactions in the electronic auction system; receiving authorization from the user prior to the beginning of an electronic auction provided by the electronic auction web site to execute an automatic payment method after the conclusion of the electronic auction, wherein the automatic payment method includes at least automatically deducting funds from one of the electronic payment accounts corresponding to the user of the electronic auction web site; and executing the automatic payment method for the user after the conclusion of the electronic auction, if the user has provided authorization prior to the beginning of the electronic auction for executing the automatic payment method, the executing step being performed by at least one processor and comprising the steps of: automatically deducting funds from the payment account corresponding to the user of the electronic auction web site; and automatically transferring at least a portion of the deducted funds into at least one account for automatically effecting payment for the user of the electronic auction web site, wherein at least one payment source corresponding to the user of the electronic auction web site is used to obtain funds for storing within the payment account prior to deducting funds from the payment account.