Patent ID: 6980960

Claim:
A method operable on a computer to provide a plurality of users participating in a fuel pricing program respective rebate payments relating to purchases of automotive fuel, comprising the steps of: receiving an account identifier associated with each user; receiving, from each user, an anticipated geographic area associated with automotive fuel purchases; storing said received anticipated geographic areas in association with each respective received account identifier on said computer; receiving purchase information indicating purchases of said automotive fuel at a retail price and at a geographic location using a respective account identifier; storing said received purchase information on said computer; utilizing the computer to calculate a payment due to each user; and providing each user a respective calculated payment; wherein each respective payment is calculated by said computer based at least in part upon one of a first program price associated with each user and a second program price associated with each user as well as upon said retail price, wherein the first program price for each user is independent of the first program price for each other user and the second program price for each user is independent of the second program price for each other user; and wherein each payment for each user is calculated by said computer based at least in part upon the respective first program price for that user when the geographic location of the automotive fuel purchase corresponds to the anticipated geographic area associated with automotive fuel purchases for that user and each payment for each user is calculated by said computer based at least in part upon the respective second program price for that user when the geographic location of the automotive fuel purchase does not correspond to said anticipated geographic area associated with automotive fuel purchases for that user.