Patent ID: 8504410

Claim:
A customer satisfaction system comprising: a server and a plurality of customer satisfaction rating terminals: the server configured to store and access member services including member registration information, member feedback, member savings accounts and a membership directory; the server configured to store and access vendor services including vendor registration information, vendor data files, vendor inventory and price lists, and vendor comparisons; the server and the plurality of customer satisfaction rating terminals configured to execute a member directory component including a geographic area hierarchy that includes neighborhood granularity, a product or service category hierarchy, a shopping venue type hierarchy that classifies the shopping venue type, a price range hierarchy and member discounts component that provides implementation of discounts and rewards offered by participating vendors and a ratings component; the plurality of customer satisfaction rating terminals configured to receive-customer satisfaction feedback from customers regarding a plurality registered vendors, wherein the plurality of customer satisfaction rating terminals comprise a plurality of point-of-sale terminals, wherein each of the plurality of point-of-sale terminals is assigned to a particular vendor, each of the plurality of point-of-sale terminals is located on the premises of the vendor in association with a purchase checkout station, and configured to receive customer satisfaction feedback in the form of customer satisfaction ratings entered at the time that the customer pays for a purchase while the customers are located at the checkout station; wherein the system further comprises at least one of a plurality of post-sale customer feedback stations or search engine portals configured to receive via the server, more detailed customer feedback after the purchase has been completed from locations other than the point-of-sale locations; a customer satisfaction aggregation system configured to receive the customer satisfaction feedback from the each of the plurality of point-of-sale terminals and the post-sale customer feedback stations customer satisfaction rating terminals and consolidating the customer satisfaction feedback to provide an aggregate customer satisfaction rating for each registered vendor; a customer satisfaction dissemination system operable that provides access to a customer satisfaction qualified vendor directory containing a plurality of vendor entries, wherein each vendor entry contains contact information and the aggregate customer satisfaction rating determined by the customer satisfaction aggregation system for the associated vendor; and wherein the customer satisfaction qualified vendor directory is organized and searchable by geographic location of the plurality of registered vendors, and for each geographic location contains vendor entries organized and searchable by category of product or service offered by the vendors.