Patent ID: 8684265

Claim:
A method comprising: during a Web session involving interactions between a member and a Web site of a commerce partner, using user identification information to determine user account information for the member, wherein the member is a member of a loyalty program of an entity, wherein member is a member of a different loyalty program of the commerce partner, wherein the user identification information is used to identify account information for the loyalty program and is used to identity account information of the different loyalty program; during the Web session, identifying non-negotiable credits earned from previous interactions with the loyalty program of the entity, wherein the non-negotiable credits are loyalty points of the loyalty program, wherein the non-negotiable credits are redeemable for a restricted list of goods or services that are provided by the entity; during the Web session, converting a quantity of the non-negotiable credits to a quantity of entity independent funds, wherein the converting is performed by the Web site, which is operated by a different legal entity than the entity, wherein the entity independent funds are loyalty points of the different loyalty program of the commerce partner, wherein the commerce partner redeems the entity independent funds for a commerce partner goods or for commerce partner services, wherein at least a portion of the commerce partner goods or the commerce partner services are not included in the restricted list; during the Web session, adding the quantity of entity independent funds from the converting to an existing quantity of entity independent funds of a funds account maintained for the member as part of the different loyalty program; during the Web session, permitting access, to entity independent funds of the funds account; during the Web session, applying at least a portion of the entity independent funds of the funds account to one or more purchases for commerce partner goods or commerce partner services, wherein the commerce partner goods or commerce partner services of the one or more purchases are not included in the restricted list, wherein the Web site does not accept the non-negotiable credits for the commerce partner goods or commerce partner services in absence of the converting, wherein the identifying of non-negotiable credits is performed by computing equipment having at least one processor executing program instructions that are digitally encoded in at least one storage device, wherein the converting is performed by computing equipment having at least one processor executing program instructions that are digitally encoded in at least one storage device, wherein the permitting of access to the quantity of negotiable funds is performed by computing equipment having at least one processor executing program instructions that are digitally encoded in at least one storage device.