Patent ID: 7761353

Claim:
A computer-implemented method, comprising: receiving an indication of a financial account of a user for use with financial transactions involving the user; and automatically validating use of the financial account by, initiating one or more deposits to the financial account for use in validating the financial account, each deposit being of a determined amount, the initiating of the one or more deposits being performed by one or more programmed computing systems; initiating physical delivery of an item to a location associated with the user, the item having multiple distinct account validation identifier candidates for the account such that each of the multiple account validation identifier candidates is identifiable from the item using one or more numerical amounts, at least one of the multiple account validation identifier candidates being identifiable using the determined amounts of the one or more deposits; providing instructions for identifying one or more of the multiple account validation identifier candidates from the delivered item by using amounts of the initiated one or more deposits, the providing of the instructions being performed by the one or more programmed computing systems; and after receiving from the user indications of one or more of the multiple account validation identifier candidates and determining that the indicated one or more account validation identifier candidates are the at least one account validation identifier candidates, validating use of the financial account with financial transactions involving the user, the validating of the use of the financial account being performed by the one or more programmed computing systems.