Patent ID: 7177042

Claim:
An account-settling system comprising: a buyer-side facsimile apparatus; and a seller-side apparatus which is connected to said buyer-side facsimile apparatus through an Internet, wherein said buyer-side facsimile apparatus comprises: an operation section which is operated to input account data containing a number of a credit card peculiar to a buyer and a validation period of the credit card; an apparatus-status monitoring section which monitors a condition of expendables; a notice data generating section which generates notice data containing said account data inputted from said operation section and expendable-type data of said expendables monitored by said apparatus-status monitoring section to notify to a seller; and an Internet connecting section which converts said notice data generated in said notice data generating section into data having a format to send out in said Internet, and said seller-side apparatus comprises: a notice data analyzing section which analyzes said notice data received through said Internet from said buyer-side facsimile apparatus and performs settlement based on the analyzing result, said settlement comprising: sending an inquiry to a financial entity to determine whether said buyer has a valid account; and a determination whether an expendable item in said notice data is in stock, and if so, automatically forwarding an order to a shipping department, and if not currently in stock, automatically sending an order to a purchasing department.