Patent ID: 8571988

Claim:
A method of operating an electronic money system including an information device, a money depositing terminal, a plurality of electronic money terminal devices, and an electronic money management unit, the method comprising: the money depositing terminal depositing electronic money on the information device; performing a plurality of withdrawals from the electronic money deposited on the information device at the electronic money terminal devices; the information device storing a plurality of pieces of electronic money log data, wherein each piece of electronic money log data is related to a respective withdrawal; each of the electronic money terminal devices storing a plurality of pieces of utilization-history data including at least one piece of utilization-history data related to a withdrawal that utilized another electronic money terminal device, each piece of utilization-history data including: (a) a piece of electronic money log data related to a respective withdrawal, and (b) a flag corresponding to the piece of electronic money log data, the flag indicating whether the respective electronic money terminal device was utilized during the withdrawal related to the piece of electronic money log data; causing the electronic money management unit to: (a) gather the plurality of pieces of utilization-history data, including the pieces of electronic money log data and corresponding flags, from the electronic money terminal devices, wherein the at least one piece of utilization-history data related to the withdrawal that utilized the another electronic money terminal device is gathered from an electronic money terminal other than the another electronic money terminal, (b) designate some pieces of electronic money log data as distinguished log data based on the corresponding flags, and (c) perform settlement using the distinguished log data.