Reception management system and method of handling transactions

Abstract

A reception management system for handling transactions includes a plurality of ACMs (Automated Contract/Consulting Terminals) for receiving procedure requests for predetermined transactions from customers, a plurality of ROTs (Remote Operation Terminals) to be employed by an operator for handling the procedure requests, a server for storing information for managing the operators for each transaction skill, and information about queues formed for each transaction skill upon a procedure request accepted from an ACM, and a queue monitoring terminal for monitoring the queues by receiving information from the SACD server.

1 - 19 . (canceled) 
     
     
         20 ) A management system for handling transactions, comprising:
 a plurality of contract consulting machines, each for accepting procedure requests for transactions from customers, wherein each of the transactions is one of a given group of types of transactions;   a plurality of consulting operation terminals, each having an operator, for handling the procedure requests; and   a queue monitoring device for managing the operators on a transaction skill basis, and for monitoring queues of said contract consulting machines formed for transaction skills in response to procedure requests accepted from said contract consulting machines; and wherein:   the queue monitoring device includes   an operation terminals list identifying the plurality of operation terminals and, for each of the operation terminals, one or more of the types of transactions handled by the operator of the operation terminal,   a consulting machines list identifying the plurality of consulting machines and, for each of the consulting machines, one of said types of transactions requested at the consulting machine,   a transaction type list identifying the types of transactions handled by the operators of the operation terminals; and   the queue monitoring device uses said transaction type list to assign each of the consulting machines to one of a series of queues based on the type of the transaction requested at said each consulting machine, and uses the operation terminals list to assign each of the operators to one or more of the queues to process the transaction requested at the consulting machines assigned to said one or more of the queues.   
     
     
         21 ) The management system for handling transactions according to  claim 20 ,
 wherein said queue monitoring device displays a list of contract consulting machines waiting to be assigned, each consulting machine having a priority level.   
     
     
         22 ) The management system for handling transactions according to  claim 21 ,
 wherein said queue monitoring device allows the queues to be changed by altering priority levels in said list of contract consulting machines.   
     
     
         23 ) A customer terminal for communicating with an operator terminal to process a transaction between a customer at the customer terminal and an operator at the operator terminal, the customer terminal comprising:
 a request accepting unit for accepting a reception request for a transaction of a given type from a customer;   an outputting unit for outputting the reception request and information about said transaction to a server;   a receiving unit for receiving, from said server, an estimated waiting time for a reception requested by the reception request and for receiving waiting conditions from the server at fixed intervals, the estimated waiting time being determined from a reception status of at least one operator having a predetermined transaction skill to handle transactions of the given type; and   a video conference system device for interacting with said at least one operator at the operator terminal and to enable video conferencing between the customer at the customer terminal and the operator at the operator terminal;   a display unit for displaying said estimated waiting time received by said receiving unit; and wherein   the customer terminal manages three states, including:   i) a waiting state, wherein the customer terminal waits for assignment to one of a group of operator terminals,   ii) an assignment state, wherein the customer terminal has been assigned to one of the operator terminals, and   iii) a service state, wherein the requested transaction is handled by the operating terminal to which the requested transaction is assigned;   when the customer terminal outputs the reception request, the estimated waiting time for the transaction requested by the customer terminal, and the number of persons waiting for other transactions of the given type of transaction requested by the customer terminal are displayed on the customer terminal; and   the customer terminal includes:   an operator terminal assignment interruption function of interrupting the assignment state of the customer terminal; and   a direct connection request receiving function of making a request for a direct connection from the one of the operator terminals;   the server, in response to the reception request from the customer terminal, checks to determine whether there is any record of an operator having the predetermined transaction skill needed to handle the transaction of the given type requested at the customer terminal;   the server assigns the customer to a selected one of the operators, and once the customer is assigned to the selected operator, the state of the customer terminal changes to the assignment state or the service state;   
       upon receiving the reception request, the server calculates the estimated waiting time on the basis of the number of operators that have logged on the server, and a skill level and an expertness for each of the operators at handling transactions of the given type requested at the customer terminal; 
       the receiving unit receives a priority for said transaction based on given criteria. 
     
     
         24 ) The terminal according to  claim 23 , further comprising a customer identification unit for identifying the customer making the reception request, wherein said estimated waiting time is determined further based on information about the customer identified by said customer identification unit. 
     
     
         25 ) The customer terminal according to  claim 23 , wherein:
 the customer has a customer ID, and the customer is assigned to a selected one of the operators on the basis of the customer ID.   
     
     
         26 ) The terminal according to  claim 24 , wherein the given criteria includes the reception status of the operator terminal of the selected operator. 
     
     
         27 ) The customer terminal according to  claim 23 , wherein:
 the customer is put in a line to wait for one of the operators;   when the customer terminal is connected to one of the operators in charge of another transaction due to an error of the customer, said priority is changed, thereby accepting the transaction with a higher priority, so there is no need for the customer to line up again.   
     
     
         28 ) The customer terminal according to  claim 23 , wherein:
 after said estimated waiting time and the number of waiting persons are displayed, the reception request is suspended until selected information is received from the server; thereafter, a check is made to determine if the customer terminal is connected to one of the operator terminals; and if the customer terminal is connected to one of the operator terminals, the reception request is ended.