Patent ID: 8239269

Claim:
A method of facilitating return of products sold in connection with services at point-of-sale (POS) locations, the method comprising: registering a sale of a service and a product associated with the service to a customer with an electronic registration (ER) system, the registering including storing an original sale date and an identifier associated with the product in an ER database of the ER system; when the service is cancelled by the customer at the POS location: processing a return transaction through the ER system in accordance with a return policy of the POS location and/or the service provider, and updating the ER database to reflect the return of the product and the cancellation of the service; and when the service is cancelled by the customer through the service provider: taking a monetary interest from the customer, on behalf of the POS location, in the event that the customer does not subsequently return the product to the POS location in order to help protect the POS location from having to absorb a loss associated with the customer's of the interest, wherein the interest corresponds to an amount of commission owed to the POS location from the service provider.