US-12619963-B2 - Linking gaming establishment fund management account with financial account associated with payment instrument

US12619963B2US 12619963 B2US12619963 B2US 12619963B2US-12619963-B2

Abstract

Systems and methods that, responsive to a receipt, from a component of a credit card issuer, of a request for payment of an amount of debt incurred in association with a credit card, utilize funds associated with a gaming establishment account to transact against an amount of funds owed in association with a financial account associated with the credit card. If a determination, based on the gaming establishment account, occurs to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, the systems and methods automatically initiate a transfer of an amount of funds associated with the amount of debt from the gaming establishment account to the account associated with the credit card.

Inventors

Kevin Higgins
Lisa Schiffer
Jeffery Shepherd

Assignees

Dates

Publication Date: 20260505
Application Date: 20230510

Claims (16)

1 . A gaming establishment fund management system comprising: a processor; and a memory device that stores a plurality of instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to: maintain a gaming establishment cashless wagering account independent of any servers of any credit card issuers, responsive to determining to restrict access to funds associated with the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, interface with a server of a credit card issuer to communicate data that results in a restriction of access to use of a credit card maintained independent of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, and responsive to a receipt, from the server of the credit card issuer, of data associated with a request for payment of an amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card: determine whether to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, the determination being based on a balance of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, responsive to the determination being to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, automatically initiate a transfer of an amount of funds associated with the amount of debt from the gaming establishment cashless wagering account to an account associated with the credit card maintained by the server of the credit card issuer independent of the gaming establishment fund management system and independent of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, and responsive to the determination being not to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, interface with the server of the credit card issuer to communicate data associated with a denial of the request.
2 . The gaming establishment fund management system of claim 1 , wherein the balance of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account comprises a balance of cashable funds and the determination to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card occurs responsive to the balance of cashable funds of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account at least equaling the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card.
3 . The gaming establishment fund management system of claim 1 , wherein the data associated with the request for payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card is received responsive to a user input.
4 . The gaming establishment fund management system of claim 1 , wherein the data associated with the request for payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card is automatically received based on a schedule.
5 . The gaming establishment fund management system of claim 1 , wherein the amount of funds is associated with an amount of non-cashable credits.
6 . The gaming establishment fund management system of claim 5 , wherein the memory device stores a plurality of further instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to convert the amount of non-cashable credits to the amount of funds based on a conversion factor.
7 . The gaming establishment fund management system of claim 1 , wherein the automatically initiated transfer comprises a transfer of the amount of funds associated with the amount of debt from a financial institution account that backs the gaming establishment cashless wagering account.
8 . A gaming establishment fund management system comprising: a processor; and a memory device that stores a plurality of instructions that, when executed by the processor, cause the processor to: maintain a gaming establishment cashless wagering account independent of any servers of any credit card issuers, responsive to an occurrence of a fund transfer event, interface with a component of a gaming establishment patron management system supported by a housing of an electronic gaming machine to cause a transfer of a first amount of funds from the gaming establishment cashless wagering account to a credit balance of the electronic gaming machine to enable a wager of at least a portion of the first amount of funds, responsive to determining to restrict access to funds associated with the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, interface with a server of a credit card issuer to communicate data that results in a restriction of access to use of a credit card maintained independent of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, and responsive to an occurrence of a credit card payment event following an issuance of a credit card statement: determine if a second amount of funds associated with the gaming establishment cashless wagering account at least equals an amount of funds owed in association with the credit card, and responsive to the determination that the second amount of funds associated with the gaming establishment cashless wagering account at least equals the amount of funds owed in association with the credit card, interface with the server of the credit card issuer to automatically cause a transfer of at least the amount of funds owed in association with the credit card from the gaming establishment cashless wagering account to an account associated with the credit card that is maintained by the server of the credit card issuer independent of the gaming establishment fund management system and independent of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account.
9 . The gaming establishment fund management system of claim 8 , wherein the amount of funds owed in association with the credit card is less than a total amount of funds due in association with the credit card statement.
10 . A method of operating a gaming establishment fund management system, the method comprising: maintaining, by a processor, a gaming establishment cashless wagering account independent of any servers of any credit card issuers; responsive to determining to restrict access to funds associated with the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, interfacing with a server of a credit card issuer to communicate data that results in a restriction of access to use of a credit card maintained independent of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, and responsive to a receipt, from the server of the credit card issuer, of data associated with a request for payment of an amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card: determining, by the processor, whether to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, the determination being based on a balance of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, responsive to the determination being to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, automatically initiating, by the processor, a transfer of an amount of funds associated with the amount of debt from the gaming establishment cashless wagering account to an account associated with the credit card maintained by the server of the credit card issuer independent of the gaming establishment fund management system and independent of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account, and responsive to the determination being not to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, interfacing with the server of the credit card issuer to communicate data associated with a denial of the request.
11 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the balance of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account comprises a balance of cashable funds and the determination to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card occurs responsive to the balance of cashable funds of the gaming establishment cashless wagering account at least equaling the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card.
12 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the data associated with the request for payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card is received responsive to a user input.
13 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the data associated with the request for payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card is automatically received based on a schedule.
14 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the amount of funds is associated with an amount of non-cashable credits.
15 . The method of claim 14 , further comprising converting, by the processor, the amount of non-cashable credits to the amount of funds based on a conversion factor.
16 . The method of claim 10 , wherein the automatically initiated transfer comprises a transfer of the amount of funds associated with the amount of debt from a financial institution account that backs the gaming establishment cashless wagering account.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS This application is related to the following commonly owned co-pending patent applications: U.S. application Ser. No. 18/195,666, entitled “ON-DEMAND ACCESS TO FUNDS OF GAMING ESTABLISHMENT FUND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNT ASSOCIATED WITH A FINANCIAL ACCOUNT.”; and U.S. application Ser. No. 18/195,731, entitled “GAMING ESTABLISHMENT FUND MANAGEMENT ACCOUNT EMPLOYED TO DETERMINE DYNAMIC LIMIT OF FINANCIAL ACCOUNT,”. BACKGROUND In various embodiments, the systems and methods of the present disclosure utilize funds associated with a gaming establishment account to transact against an amount of funds owed in association with a financial account. Casinos are associated with multiple different channels of commerce including gaming activities (e.g., wagers on plays of games at electronic gaming machines and gaming tables) and non-gaming activities (e.g., making retail purchases at point-of-sale terminals throughout the casino). BRIEF SUMMARY In certain embodiments, the present disclosure relates to a system including a processor, and a memory device that stores a plurality of instructions. When executed by the processor responsive to a receipt, from a component of a credit card issuer, of data associated with a request for payment of an amount of debt incurred in association with a credit card and responsive to a determination, based on a gaming establishment account, to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, the instructions cause the processor to automatically initiate a transfer of an amount of funds associated with the amount of debt from the gaming establishment account to an account associated with the credit card. When executed by the processor responsive to the receipt, from the component of the credit card issuer, of data associated with the request for payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card and responsive to a determination, based on the gaming establishment account, to reject the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, the instructions cause the processor to communicate a denial to the component of the credit card issuer. In certain embodiments, the present disclosure relates to a system including a processor, and a memory device that stores a plurality of instructions. When executed by the processor responsive to an occurrence of a credit card payment event following an issuance of a credit card statement, the instructions cause the processor to determine if an amount of funds associated with a gaming establishment account at least equals an amount of funds owed in association with a credit card. When executed by the processor responsive to the determination that the amount of funds associated with the gaming establishment account at least equals the amount of funds owed in association with the credit card, the instructions cause the processor to cause a transfer of at least the amount of funds owed in association with the credit card from the gaming establishment account to an account associated with the credit card and maintained by a component of a credit card issuer. In certain embodiments, the present disclosure relates to a method of operating a system. Responsive to a receipt, from a component of a credit card issuer, of data associated with a request for payment of an amount of debt incurred in association with a credit card and responsive to a determination, based on a gaming establishment account, to authorize the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, the method includes automatically initiating, by a processor, a transfer of an amount of funds associated with the amount of debt from the gaming establishment account to an account associated with the credit card. Responsive to the receipt, from the component of the credit card issuer, of data associated with the request for payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card and responsive to a determination, based on the gaming establishment account, to reject the payment of the amount of debt incurred in association with the credit card, the method includes communicating a denial to the component of the credit card issuer. Additional features are described herein, and will be apparent from the following Detailed Description and the figures. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS FIG. 1 is an example configuration of the architecture of a plurality of different components of the system of the present disclosure. FIGS. 2A and 2B are flow charts of example processes for operating a system which employs funds maintained in a gaming establishment account to settle a debt associated with an account accessible via a linked credit card. FIG. 3 is a flow chart of an example process for operating a system which illustrates the interactions between different components which operate to synchronize the blocking of use of a cre