GB2315707A - Booklet for notifying shareholders of share dividend with removable portions - Google Patents

Abstract

The booklet includes pages with a portion 12 eg a cheque, tax voucher or share certificate, which is detachable without affecting the integrity of the booklet, so allowing the booklet to be retained and subsequently referred to. The booklet is bound along a common edge 6 by gluing. The booklets 2 are prepared by collating pages printed with common and personalised data from reels 15.

Description

Business Booklet The invention which is the subject of this application relates to a business document and particularly, but not exclusively, a business document of the type issued by companies to their shareholders informing them of company performance, share dividend and/or profit share details and usually also including a tax voucher, cheque and other personalised data.

Conventionally, companies have issued dividend documents in one continuous sheet and the sheet includes portions to be removed for separate use. Said portions can be any of, for example, cheques for cashing as payment of the company dividend, tax vouchers which are required to be removed and used as evidence if required and, on some occasions, portions which are to be returned to the company to indicate the choosing of an option or provide further information.

This conventional format has been regarded as being the only possible way of securely providing the shareholder information and any payments due because it is a single sheet and the issuer can therefore be sure that all of the information on the single sheet will relate to the same recipient and so all of information thereon is provided to the correct recipient. However, this format is not convenient for the recipient of the document as, once they have received the same, they are required to remove portions of the sheet and the sheet quickly becomes difficult to handle and portions of the same may become separated or torn thereby making it difficult for the shareholder to safely store all of the information provided for future reference. Furthermore, with the portions removed, the single sheet has an untidy and unattractive appearance and frequently does not convey a suitable image to the recipient who, if they are a shareholder, the issuer may wish to impress and who, of course, are required to be satisfied with the company's overall performance in order for them to further invest in the same.

The aim of the present invention is to provide a means which allows an issuer of information to report said information to specified recipients in a document which includes removable portions as necessary and to allow removal of the same without affecting the integrity of the document and also to allow the document to be personalised for specified recipients.

In a first aspect of the invention there is provided a business booklet, said booklet comprising a number of pages attached along a common edge, said pages containing printed information and data and wherein at least one of the pages includes a removable portion to be selectively removed by the recipient of the booklet while maintaining the structure of the booklet, thereby allowing the same to be stored and referred to and the booklet includes personalised data on at least one of the pages.

Typically the said booklet includes a number of pages which are common to a series of said booklets and specific parts of a page or specific pages which include personalised data for a designated recipient of that specific booklet. In one embodiment the at least one page with the removable portion also includes personalised data printed thereon.

In one embodiment the booklet includes personalised data on the outer pages of said booklet and/or personalised data which is viewable when looking at said outer pages. The outer pages of the booklet can be formed of a different material type than the remainder of the pages to improve the external appearance of the booklet.

It is envisaged that one beneficial embodiment is where the booklet is a dividend report for shares in a company and includes at least one removable portion which is a cheque with personalised data relating to the recipient of the booklet and pages common to a series of booklets which report the performance of the company.

In one form the booklet includes in at least one of the pages an additional sheet portion applied thereto to form a two ply structure.

In a further aspect of the invention there is provided a method of preparing a series of business booklets comprising the steps of printing and preparing each of the pages which are common to the series of booklets and storing on separate reels, each reel comprising a plurality of the same page; feeding each of the reels to the forming apparatus in a synchronised manner, separating and collating separated pages from respective reels, attaching one set of pages for one booklet along a common edge to form said booklet, the pages in said booklet which include personalised data being printed, prepared and collated simultaneously so as to be included at the correct location when forming the booklet.

In one embodiment the information is laser printed and/or impacted onto the pages of the booklet and the pages which include or are to include personalised data are also held in reels and fed simultaneously.

In one embodiment the pages which are to include personalised data are first printed and prepared with information which is common to said pages for a set of booklets and then passed through a further printing operation to allow the addition of the personalised data to each of the said pages prior to collation and forming the booklet.

Alternatively the personalised data is printed at the same time as the oter printing operation such tah the printing time for the personalised data pages is similar to those carrying the general information. The printing of the personalised data is thereby controlled by computer memory to ensure that the pages for a specific booklet are printed in the same order for each of the respective reels thereby ensuring that, when collated, the information in one booklet all relates to the same intended recipient.

In an alternative embodiment the pages which are to include personalised data are first printed and prepared with information which is common to said pages for a set of booklets whereupon there is attached in a specified area of each of said pages, a sheet which carries said personalised data. Each of said sheets can be printed with said personalised data prior to application to said pages and each of said sheets is adhered to the page to form a two ply portion of the said page.

Thus each said booklet comprises a number of pages attached to each other along a common edge and at least one of the pages includes a removable portion to be selectively removed by the recipient of the booklet and the integrity of the booklet is maintained thereby allowing the same to be stored and referred to at a later date.

If the business booklet includes a dividend payment from a company to it's shareholders, each booklet is prepared for a designated shareholder but each booklet may include a number of pages which are common to all booklets and in one embodiment it may only be specific parts of a page which are prepared for a designated shareholder.

As appropriate pages are collated and attached to form the business booklet, all of the pages in the booklet are related to the designated recipient for that booklet. This thereby ensures that the required security and accuracy of the booklets is obtained.

Thus it will be seen that the business booklet formed according to the invention allows pages to be included which are substantially wholly removable or have removable portions and yet even when these pages or portions are removed, the integrity of the booklet as a whole is maintained as at least the edge portion of each page remains within the booklet and this ensures that the shareholder still has a useful and informative booklet to store and refer to in the future.

Specific embodiments of the invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings; wherein Figure 1 illustrates a business booklet according to the present invention; Figure 2 illustrates a page of the booklet with a removable portion and including personalised data; and Figure 3 illustrates schematically a method of forming the business booklet.

Referring firstly to Figure 1,a business booklet 2 according to the invention comprises a plurality of pages 4 each of which is joined along a common edge 6 which forms a spine of the booklet. In the embodiment shown the edges are joined by gluing but any suitable method can be used. Each of the pages can be made from the same grade of paper or alternatively the front and back pages can be made from a harder wearing paper or card and any of the pages can be manufactured from suitable security paper if required.

The front page 8 includes a window 10 for the viewing of personalised data in the form of name and address which is printed on the inner page.

Each of the pages has information and data printed thereon which relates to the company and/or the dividend and/or further instructions to the recipient. Some of the pages are common in that each of a set of booklets will include the same pages with the same information printed thereon. However other pages or portions of pages will include personalised data printed thereon thus identifying each booklet as that of a particular party and said booklet including information and/or data which is specific to that party.

The booklet also has pages which include removable portions 12 as is shown in Figure 2 and in some instances the majority of the page can be removed. Typically the removal of the portions is achieved by tearing along perforated lines 14 as shown. In Figure 2 the removable portion is a cheque issued to the recipient of the booklet for payment of a share dividend and so in this embodiment shown the pages includes a removable portion and also includes personalised data printed thereon which provides the sum of the cheque and the name to whom the cheque is payable.. Other removable portions could be tax vouchers, share certificates and the like. However, even when these portions are removed the integrity of the booklet is maintained as the common edge 6 remains joined and thus the business booklet still has the same format as when originally provided so that it can subsequently be stored and referred to in the future without fear of losing parts of the said information..

Figure 3 illustrates one method of forming the business booklet according to the invention wherein there are provided a number of reels of paper 15, the number of the same being equal to the number of pages of the booklet to be formed. Each reel has a plurality of the same page -printed thereon by laser and/or impact printing. The reels are then fed in a synchronised manner and adhered, for example, at location 16 to define, in continuous stationary form, a plurality of the booklets 2 which are then detached, for example, at location 17 and fed to a collator. It is important that the reels 15 are fed at the correct speed as some of the pages may have had, or may have before collation, personalised data printed thereon in relation to a specific recipient, and or personalised data sheets applied thereto, so that at least some of the reels are required to be prepared and/or printed in the same sequence and speed for specific recipients to ensure that the pages which include personalised data for a specific recipient are all collated and joined together in the same booklet as it would be unacceptable for a shareholder to receive what could be sensitive information relating to another shareholder.

Thus the business booklet as herein described has significant advantage over conventional means provided for the reporting of dividend information to shareholders as it allows portions of the same to be removed while still allowing the booklet to be used and referred to thereafter as an integral unit. Although specific reference is made herein to use of the business booklet for reporting dividend information it should be understood that the booklet is of equal advantage in many other areas of providing information where it is required that the booklet be retained for subsequent use or referral and not simply discarded and it should be clear that the current application is provided to cover other possible uses.

Claims (18)

Claims

1. A business booklet, said booklet comprising a number of pages attached along a common edge, said pages containing printed information and data and wherein at least one of the pages includes a removable portion to be selectively removed by the recipient of the booklet while maintaining the structure of the booklet, thereby allowing the same to be stored and referred to and the booklet includes personalised data on at least one of the pages.

2. A business booklet according to Claim 1 wherein the said booklet includes a number of pages which are common to a series of said booklets and specific parts of a page or specific pages which include personalised data for a designated recipient of that specific booklet.

3. A business booklet according to claim 1 wherein the at least one page with the removable portion also includes personalised data printed thereon.

4. A business booklet according to claim 3 wherein the booklet includes personalised data on the outer pages of said booklet and/or personalised data which is viewable when looking at said outer pages.

5. A business booklet according to claim 1 wherein the outer pages of the booklet are formed of a different material type than the remainder of the pages.

6. A business booklet according to any of the preceding claims wherein the booklet is a dividend report for shares in a company and includes at least one removable portion which is a cheque with personalised data relating to the recipient of the booklet and pages common to a series of booklets which report the performance of the company.

7. A business booklet according to the preceding claims wherein at least one of the pages of the booklet includes at least an additional portion applied thereto to form a two ply structure.

8. A method of preparing a series of business booklets comprising the steps of printing and preparing each of the pages which are common to the series of booklets and storing on a separate reel, each reel comprising a plurality of the same page; feeding each of the reels to the forming apparatus in a synchronised manner, separating and collating pages from respective reels, attaching one set of pages for one booklet along a common edge to form said booklet, the pages in said booklet which include personalised data being printed, prepared and collated simultaneously so as to be included at the correct location when forming the booklet.

9. A method according to Claim 8 wherein the information is laser printed and/or impacted onto the pages of the booklet.

10. A method according to claim 8 wherein those pages which include personalised data are printed in one operation with the personalised data and any common information or data being printed on the page at the same time.

11. A method according to claim 10 wherein each reel which is for a page which includes personalised data includes a plurality o said pages thereon, each of said pages carrying personalised and distinct data.

12. A method according to claim 11 wherein a series of said reels, each carrying pages with personalised data are arranged such that the location of each page in each reel for a particular recipient lie at the same relative position in the reel.

13. A method according to claim 8 wherein the pages which are to include personalised data are first printed and prepared with information which is common to said pages for a set of booklets and then passed through a further printing operation to allow the addition of the personalised data to each of the said pages prior to collation and forming the booklet.

14. A method according to claim 8 wherein the pages which are to include personalised data are first printed and prepared with information which is common to said pages for a set of booklets whereupon there is attached in a specified area of each of said pages, a sheet which carries said personalised data.

15. A method according to claim 14 wherein each of said sheets is printed with said personalised data prior to application to said pages.

16. A method according to claim 15 wherein the said sheet is adhered to the page to form a two ply portion of the said page.

17. A business booklet as hereinbefore described with reference to the accompanying drawings.

18. A method of forming a business booklet as hereinbefore described with reference to the accompanying drawings.