Importance

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Abstract

An electronic-monetary system having (1) banks or financial institutions that are coupled to a money generator device for generating and issuing to subscribing customers electronic money including electronic currency backed by demand deposits and electronic credit authorizations; (2) correspondent banks that accept and distribute the electronic money; (3) a plurality of transaction devices that are used by subscribers for storing electronic money, for performing money transactions with the on-line systems of the participating banks or for exchanging electronic money with other like transaction devices in off-line transactions; (4) teller devices, associated with the issuing and correspondent banks, for process handling and interfacing the transaction devices to the issuing and correspondent banks, and for interfacing between the issuing and correspondent banks themselves; (5) a clearing bank for balancing the electronic money accounts of the different issuing banks; (6) a data communications network for providing communications services to all components of the system; and (7) a security arrangement for maintaining the integrity of the system, and for detecting counterfeiting and tampering within the system. An embodiment of the invention includes a customer service module which handles lost money claims and links accounts to money modules for providing bank access.

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First Claim