Patent ID: 7527198

Claim:
A host notification method for use in an electronic checkout system that includes an optical code reader and electronic article surveillance (EAS) system, the checkout system coupled to an electronic point-of-sale (POS) terminal, the method comprising the following steps: operating in an automatic activation mode whereby the EAS system is automatically activated in response to a signal from the optical code reader of good read of a product optical code to deactivate an EAS tag of the product; operating in a manual activation mode whereby the EAS system is manually activated by action of an operator to deactivate an EAS tag; detecting, by the checkout system, a manual deactivation attempt of the LAS system; electronically determining whether the manual deactivation attempt was successful; in response to determining a successful manual deactivation attempt, transmitting notification thereof by mimicking a reading operation of a read product optical code by transmitting a predetermined special optical code data to the POS terminal or host system using a pre-existing interface of the POS terminal or host system that is operative to handle product optical code data; storing, by the POS terminal or host system, the predetermined special optical code data, wherein the predetermined special optical code data does not identify a product, is of a same format as product optical code data, and is able to be processed via the pre-existing interface.