Patent ID: 6990469

Claim:
A method of reissuing secured postage indicium comprising the steps of: dispensing from a postage meter an original postage indicium as evidence of postage dispensed for a requested postage transaction, the original postage indicium including postage information and authentication information; storing within the postage meter a transaction record for the dispensed original postage indicium, the transaction record including the postage information and the authentication information; receiving at the postage meter a request to reissue the original postage indicium; obtaining the postage information and the authentication information from the transaction record; combining the obtained postage information and the authentication information with an indicator thereby creating a modified original postage indicium; dispensing the modified original postage indicium from the postage meter so that the indicator is obtainable from the dispensed modified original postage indicium to identify by itself that the dispensed modified original postage indicium is a reissue of the original postage indicium; including in the postage meter a counter for counting the number of times modified original postage indicium are dispensed from the postage meter; storing a predetermined reissue limit in the postage meter and disabling the postage meter from dispensing modified original postage indicium when the number of times the modified original postage indicium has been dispensed exceeds the predetermined reissue limit.