JP2002207935A - Sales system - Google Patents

Abstract

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To allow a sales system which sells an article, etc., provided by a provider to a customer through a mediator to smoothly and easily pay a commission to the mediator and the cost price to the provider from the memory that the customer pays. SOLUTION: The customer 21 browses a homepage 40, and reserves and pays for a tour or cancels the tour. Through the homepage 40, the customer 21 is charged for the tour or repayment processing is performed if the tour is canceled. Further, the homepage 40 pays the commission to a personal computer 2 of the selling tour agent 1 (mediator) according to the payment of the tour price and pays the cost to a personal computer 12 of the organizing tour company (provider). When the tour is canceled, on the other hand, the homepage 40 charges the selling tour agent 1 and organizing tour company 11 for repayment respectively.

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

The present invention relates to a computer of a provider of goods or services (hereinafter, also referred to as goods, etc.),
The present invention relates to a sales system that sells products and the like provided by the provider to the customer via the mediator by connecting the computer of the mediator and the computer of the customer via an information communication network.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Conventionally, sales of merchandise and the like generally involve an intermediary between a provider of the merchandise and the like and a customer. For example, an organized travel agency (provider) that plans a package tour by combining various travel materials such as a hotel and an airplane sells the package tour to a customer through a sales agency (intermediary) such as a dealer. . As described above, when the sale of a product or the like is performed through an intermediary, the amount received from the customer by the intermediary includes the commission of the intermediary and the cost to be paid to the provider. Therefore, when the intermediary receives the price from the customer, it divides the fee into a fee and a cost, records the fee as its own income, and deposits the cost into the provider.

[0003]

However, the work of dividing the price received from the customer into a fee and a cost is extremely complicated, and a heavy burden is imposed on the intermediary. In particular, when the commission is changed, the above-mentioned work is further complicated. In addition, if the money received from the customer is retained by the intermediary for a long time, the provider may not be able to recover the expenses for a long time, which may adversely affect the management of the provider.

Further, when a customer cancels a request for providing goods or the like after canceling the package tour, such as when the customer cancels a package tour, it is necessary to refund the customer an amount obtained by subtracting a predetermined cancellation fee from the above price. . In this case, the mediator usually refunds the above amount to the customer, and then requests the provider for the amount to be refunded by the provider. Such a process also requires a complicated operation, and if the repayment from the provider is delayed, the intermediary may not be able to recover expenses for a long time and may adversely affect its management.

[0005] Therefore, the present invention provides a sales system for selling goods and the like provided by a provider to a customer via a middleman. , Respectively, for the purpose of depositing smoothly and easily. According to the second aspect of the present invention, even when a refund is given to a customer, the intermediary and the provider can be smoothly and easily charged with the amount to be refunded, respectively.
The invention described in 7 or 7 has been made for a further object to smoothly cope with a change in fee.

[0006]

Means for Solving the Problems and Effects of the Invention In order to achieve the above object, the invention according to claim 1 comprises a computer of a provider of goods or services, a computer of an agent, and a computer of a customer. By connecting via the information communication network, a sales system for selling the goods or services provided by the provider to the customer via the intermediary, and from the computer of the customer via the information communication network When the provision of the goods or services is requested, a customer-side billing means for billing the customer to the customer via the information communication network, and in accordance with the billing by the customer-side billing means, A commission depositing means for depositing a commission to the intermediary via the information communication network, and a cost portion obtained by subtracting the commission from the price in accordance with the billing by the customer billing means is provided. Characterized in that and a cost component deposit means for payment through the information communication network.

According to the present invention thus configured, when a customer's computer is requested to provide a product or service via an information communication network and the product or the like is sold, the customer side billing means uses the product or the service. Is charged to the customer via the information communication network. On the other hand, according to the billing by the customer billing means,
The commission depositing means deposits the commission of the above-mentioned price to the intermediary via the information communication network. Similarly, in response to the billing by the customer billing means, the cost-sharing money-receiving means pays the cost minus the commission from the price to the provider via the information communication network.

[0008] Therefore, according to the present invention, it is possible to smoothly and easily deposit the commission from the fee charged to the customer to the intermediary and the cost to the provider. Therefore, the intermediary is released from the work of dividing the price into the fee and the cost, and the occurrence of a calculation error can be satisfactorily avoided. In addition, it is possible to satisfactorily avoid occurrence of a situation where the cost is not paid to the provider for a long time, and the management of the intermediary and the provider can be satisfactorily soundened. The payment to the provider and the intermediary may be executed after the above-mentioned payment is paid from the customer, or may be executed at the same time as charging the customer.

According to a second aspect of the present invention, in addition to the configuration of the first aspect, when a request for providing the goods or services from the customer's computer is canceled after the request,
Refund means for refunding the amount obtained by subtracting a predetermined cancellation fee from the price to the customer via the information communication network, and according to the refund by the refund means, the fee equivalent to the fee of the cancellation fee is calculated as the fee. The intermediary-side charging means for charging the intermediary via the information communication network with the amount subtracted from the information communication network, and, in accordance with the refund by the refund means, subtracts the cost equivalent of the cancellation fee from the cost. Provider charging means for charging the provider to the provider via the information communication network,
It is further characterized by being provided.

According to the present invention, when a so-called cancellation in which a request for providing the goods or the like made by the customer's computer is canceled after the request is made, the refund means uses the amount obtained by subtracting a predetermined cancellation fee from the price for information communication. Refund to the customer via the net. On the other hand, the intermediary charging means charges the intermediary via the information communication network an amount obtained by subtracting the fee equivalent of the cancellation fee from the fee in accordance with the refund by the refund means. Similarly, in response to the refund by the refund means, the provider-side charging means charges the provider via the information communication network an amount obtained by subtracting the cost equivalent of the cancellation fee from the cost. I do.

For this reason, according to the present invention, in the event that a cancellation is made, a process of refunding an amount obtained by subtracting a predetermined cancellation fee from the above-mentioned price, or providing an intermediary and a provider with each of the refunds, Can be smoothly and easily performed. Therefore, according to the present invention, in addition to the effect of the invention described in claim 1, it is possible to smoothly and easily charge the intermediary agent and the provider the amount to be refunded to each of the agents even when refunding the customer.
Therefore, the intermediary is released from the work of charging the provider for the above-mentioned amount, and the occurrence of calculation errors and the like can be avoided well. In addition, since the intermediary does not need to change the total amount of the refund to the customer, the management can be soundly performed.

The invention described in claim 3 is the first or second invention.
In addition to the configuration described above, the information communication network is also connected to the account of the provider, the account of the intermediary, and the account of the customer, and each means debits the corresponding account via the information communication network. Alternatively, the above-described billing, payment, or refund is performed by performing a transfer.

That is, in the present invention, the above-mentioned billing, depositing,
Alternatively, since the refund is made by debit or transfer to the account, in addition to the effects of the first or second aspect of the present invention, there is an effect that the above-mentioned billing, deposit, or refund can be performed extremely smoothly. In addition, since the present invention does not go through a third party such as a credit card company as in the invention described below, the profits of the intermediary and the provider can be more favorably secured.

The invention described in claim 4 is the first or second invention.
In addition to the configuration described above, the information communication network is also connected to a computer of a credit card company having a contract with any of the provider, the intermediary, and the customer, and each of the units is connected to a computer of the credit card company. The charging, the depositing, or the refund is performed through the credit card company by transmitting and receiving predetermined data between the above.

That is, according to the present invention, the charging, depositing,
Alternatively, since the refund is performed by so-called card settlement, in addition to the effects of the first or second aspect of the invention, there is an effect that the billing, deposit, or refund can be performed extremely smoothly. In addition, when card payment is used in this way, it is possible to provide customers with pleasure such as an increase in credit points.

The invention according to claim 5 is the invention according to claim 1 or 2.
In addition to the configuration described above, each of the above-described units may be configured to perform the accounting, via the exchange of electronic money between the computer of the provider, the computer of the intermediary, and the computer of the customer.
Deposit or refund.

That is, in the present invention, the above-mentioned billing, depositing,
Alternatively, since the refund is performed by exchanging electronic money, there is an effect that, in addition to the effects of the invention described in claim 1 or 2, the charging, depositing, or refund can be performed extremely smoothly. Further, since this kind of electronic money is directly exchanged between computers, the immediacy of the charging, depositing or refund becomes more remarkable, and the profit of the intermediary and the provider is further improved because the money does not pass through a third party. Can be secured.

According to a sixth aspect of the present invention, in addition to the configuration of any one of the first to fifth aspects, the ratio of the commission to the price is adjusted according to the sales volume of the goods or services by the intermediary. It is characterized by further comprising first changing means for changing.

In sales via a middleman, a so-called overcommission is often employed in which the commission rate increases when the middleman sells a predetermined amount or more. In the present invention, the first changing means changes the ratio of the commission to the price (ie, the commission rate) in accordance with the sales volume of the product or the like by the mediator. Therefore, in the present invention, claims 1 to
In addition to the effects of the invention described in any one of the fifth to fifth aspects, there is an effect that it is possible to smoothly cope with a change in commission according to the sales volume. Therefore, it is possible to easily adopt a mediation mode in which the commission rate is changed according to the sales amount, including the above-mentioned overcommission.

According to a seventh aspect of the present invention, in addition to the configuration of any one of the first to sixth aspects, based on a command transmitted from the provider's computer via the communication line, the fee occupying the fee is calculated. Characterized by further comprising a second changing means for changing the ratio.

The above fees may be changed from time to time based on the contract between the provider and the intermediary. According to the present invention, the second changing means changes the ratio of the fee to the price based on an instruction transmitted from the provider's computer via the communication line. For this reason, in the present invention, in addition to the effect of the invention described in any one of claims 1 to 6, it is necessary to smoothly respond to a change in commission due to a contract change between the provider and the intermediary. There is an effect that can be performed.

[0022]

Next, an embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to the drawings. FIGS. 1 and 2 are explanatory diagrams showing the configuration of a sales system to which the present invention is applied. FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram showing representatives of a sales travel agency 1 and the like in detail, and FIG. FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram schematically showing a configuration of an entire system connected via W. In the present embodiment, the description will be made on the assumption that the network W as the information communication network is the Internet. However, the network W may be a dedicated line network of another project, a network such as a WAN, or a public line. It may be a network such as an intranet configured with a LAN that does not.

As shown in FIG. 1, the network W includes:
A personal computer (hereinafter referred to as a personal computer) 2 of the sales travel agency 1 as an intermediary, a personal computer 12 of the sponsored travel agency 11 as a provider, a personal computer 22 of a customer 21 as a customer, and a personal computer 32 of a material agency 31 It is connected. Further, the sales travel agency 1 establishes its own homepage 40 (see FIG. 2) by connecting the web server 3 and the database 4 to the network W.

As shown in FIG. 2, in the present embodiment, the Tokyo travel agency 1a and the Nagoya travel agency 1
b, and Okinawa Travel Agency 1c are connected to the network W,
Homepage 40 is shared. The OO pack 11a and the △△ mate 11b are connected to the network W as the sponsoring travel agent 11, and the material agents 31 are the hotels 31a and 31b and the air (airline) 31c and 31d.
And various other companies are connected to the network W. Further, various credit card companies such as a card 45 and various financial institutions such as a bank 47 are also connected to the network W.

Hereinafter, the operation of the present embodiment will be described by taking as an example a case where the sales travel agency 1 sells a package tour planned by the sponsored travel agency 11 by combining various travel materials to the customer 21. In the following description, when it is not necessary to individually distinguish the Tokyo travel agency 1a, the Nagoya travel agency 1b, and the like, they are collectively referred to as a sales travel agency 1 (the sponsor travel agency 1).
1 and so on).

FIG. 3 is a block diagram schematically illustrating the flow of data in the present embodiment. The following data flows are all performed via the network W. As described above, since the sales travel agency 1 has set up its own homepage 40, the products (package tours, etc.) handled by the sales travel agency 1 are posted on the homepage 40. The customer 21 browses the homepage 40 to make a travel reservation, pay a price, or cancel (cancel) the travel. Further, from the home page 40, the processing of charging the customer 21 for the travel price and refunding the travel price at the time of cancellation is performed.

The homepage 40 (specifically, the web server 3) pays a commission to the personal computer 2 of the sales travel agency 1 in response to the payment of the travel price, and a cost to the personal computer 12 of the sponsor travel agency 11. Pay a minute. Further, the personal computer 2 responds to the above processing by the personal computer 12.
For travel reservation.

Conversely, if the cancellation is made, the amount obtained by subtracting a predetermined cancellation fee from the travel price from the homepage 40 to the customer 21 is refunded. Also, homepage 40
In response to this refund, the fee equivalent to the fee in the cancellation fee is subtracted from the fee, and a fee is charged to the personal computer 2 of the sales travel agency 1, and the cost equivalent in the cancellation fee is charged to the personal computer 2. The amount deducted from the cost is charged to the personal computer 12 of the host travel agent 11. In response to this charge, the personal computers 2 and 12 refund the amounts to be refunded respectively. In addition, the personal computer 2 performs a travel reservation cancellation process on the personal computer 12 in accordance with the above processing. Further, commission rate change data and the like are input from the personal computer 12 to the homepage 40.

Next, FIG. 4 is an explanatory view exemplifying one of the screens viewed by the customer on the homepage 40.
As illustrated in FIG. 4, this screen includes an itinerary table 51 of a package tour as a product, a charge table 52, a travel agency display section 53 for displaying information of the nearest sales travel agency 1, and the sales agency 1 Is provided with an application button 54 for making an application / inquiry by directly connecting to the server.

In the fare table 52, the tour fee for the day of departure on that day is displayed on the calendar in A, B, and C, and the characters "full" are displayed for the departure date that has already been filled. When a desired date on which A, B, or C is displayed is clicked, the color of the display portion of the date changes, and when the application button 54 is subsequently clicked, the personal computer 2 of the customer 21 is clicked.
2 is directly connected to the personal computer 2 of the corresponding travel agency 1a-1e. For example, if the customer 21 has an address and a work place in Aichi Prefecture, the personal computer 22 is connected to the Nagoya Travel Agency 1b as shown by the dashed arrow in FIG. Then, the personal computers 2 of the travel agencies 1a to 1e send a well-known reservation screen to the personal computer 22 of the customer 21. The customer 21 completes the reservation by inputting the name and age of the traveler on the reservation screen and instructing a tour fee payment method.

Then, the web server 3 executes the following processing based on the reservation and the like. FIG. 5 is a flowchart illustrating a process executed by the web server 3. When the processing is started, the web server 3 determines whether or not the reservation has been made by the customer 21 as described above. If no reservation has been made (S1: NO), the process proceeds to S3,
It is determined whether the customer 21 has canceled (canceled). The cancellation is performed by the customer 21 reading a predetermined screen of the homepage 40 and inputting a reservation number or the like for a reserved travel. If no cancellation has been made (S3: N
O), the web server 3 ends the processing once, and restarts the processing again after a predetermined time.

In this way, the process stands by while repeating the processes of S1 and S3, and when a reservation is made (S1: YES), the process proceeds to S5. In S5, the travel fee is charged to the customer, and in S7, the process waits until payment for the fee is completed. When the payment is completed (S7: YES),
The process proceeds to S9 to execute a fee rate update process. This S9
Then, as described later, the fee rate is updated as necessary, and then, based on the fee rate, the fee of the charged amount is paid to the sales travel agency 1 (S11), and the fee is calculated based on the charged amount. The cost is subtracted and paid to the sponsor travel agency 11 (S13), and the process is temporarily terminated. That is, S
In the processing of steps S11 and S13, the travel fee charged to the customer is multiplied by the above-mentioned commission rate to obtain a fee portion, and the remaining portion is classified as a cost portion. In addition, each is deposited.

Here, the fee rate updating process in S9 will be described in detail with reference to the flowchart of FIG. In this process, first, it is determined whether or not the fee rate has been changed by the sponsored travel agency 11 in S91. Not only when the commission rate for the package tour already on sale is changed, but also when the commission rate is newly set, for example, when planning a new trip, a positive determination is made here and the process proceeds to S93. .

At S93, the changed commission rate is read, and the routine goes to S95. The change of these commission rates is performed based on data input from the personal computer 12 of the sponsored travel agency 11. In addition, if the commission rate has been left unchanged for package tours already on sale,
If the commission rate has not been changed by the sponsor travel agency 11 (S91: NO), the process directly proceeds to S95.

In S95, it is determined whether or not the number of package tour sales is equal to or more than a predetermined amount. If the number of sales is less than the predetermined amount (S95: NO), the process directly proceeds to S11 in FIG. 5, and if the number of sales is equal to or more than the predetermined amount (S95: YE).
S) After increasing the commission rate according to the rules, the process proceeds to S11. That is, when a so-called overcommission contract is made between the sponsored travel agency 11 and the sales travel agency 1, in S97, the commission rate is increased in accordance with the number of sales of the sales travel agency 1. By inserting the fee update processing (S9) in this manner, it is possible to respond very smoothly to a contract change between the sales travel agency 1 and the host travel agency 11 or a change in the commission rate according to the overcommission contract. .

Next, when the cancellation is made and the affirmative judgment is made in S3, the processing shifts to S21, and the sales travel agency is charged with an amount obtained by subtracting the commission equivalent to the cancellation fee from the fee. In the following S23, an amount obtained by subtracting the cost equivalent of the cancellation fee from the above-mentioned cost is charged to the sponsoring travel agency.
It waits at 25 for payment for those charges. When the payment is completed (S25: YES), S2
At 7, customer 2 subtracts the cancellation fee from the travel price
1 and the process is once ended.

According to the above processing, in the present embodiment, the commission of the travel price charged to the customer 21 is used as the sales travel agency 1
In addition, it is extremely smooth to pay the cost to the sponsoring travel agency 11 respectively. Accordingly, it is possible to avoid the occurrence of calculation errors and the like while saving labor costs, and it is also possible to eliminate the adverse effects caused by the sales travel agency 1 holding the travel price for a long time. Also, when the cancellation is made, the sales travel agency 1 and the sponsor travel agency 11 can smoothly charge the amount to be refunded respectively, and similarly, it is possible to avoid a calculation error while saving labor costs, It is also possible to eliminate the adverse effects caused by the sales travel agency 1 changing the refund amount for a long time.

The charge, refund, and payment are made at the bank 4
7 or a credit card company such as a card 45, and
1, the sales travel agency 1, and the customer 21 may be made through a company having a contract, or may be made through the exchange of electronic money between computers. As a method of executing billing etc. through the account of the financial institution,
For example, there is a method of using a so-called home banking system for debiting and transferring money from an account via a known payment server or the like. As a method of passing through a credit card company, for example, via a known proxy server There is a method of accessing a credit company's computer and manipulating the balance of a target credit account. These can be easily executed by registering the account numbers of the customer 21, the sales travel agency 1, and the sponsor travel agency 11 in advance.

In any case, billing, refund, and payment can be performed extremely smoothly. However, in the case of using a transfer or debit to an account, or in the case of using electronic money, a third party is not used. In addition, the profit of the sales travel agency 1 can be more favorably secured. In particular,
When using electronic money, the immediacy of billing, refund, and payment becomes even more remarkable. On the other hand, in the case of using card payment, it is possible to provide the customer 21 with pleasure such as an increase in credit points.

In the embodiment described above, S5 is the customer-side billing means, S11 is the fee-paying means, S13 is the cost-depositing means, S27 is the refund means, S21 is the intermediary-side billing means, and S23 is the billing means. Is set to S97 as the provider-side billing means.
Corresponds to a first changing unit, and S93 corresponds to a second changing unit.

Further, the present invention is not limited to the above-mentioned embodiment at all, and can be implemented in various forms without departing from the gist of the present invention. For example, in the above-described embodiment, charging (S5, S21, S23) is prioritized, and payment (S11, S1) is performed after the payment is completed.
Although 3) or refund (S27) is performed, the order may be reversed. Further, the provider may be a material supplier of the hotel 31a or the like. Further, the present invention can be used as a sales system in various industries other than the travel business.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is an explanatory diagram showing a representative configuration of a sales system to which the present invention is applied.

FIG. 2 is an explanatory diagram schematically showing the configuration of the entire sales system.

FIG. 3 is a block diagram schematically illustrating a data flow in the system.

FIG. 4 is an explanatory diagram showing an example of a homepage screen browsed by the system.

FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing a process executed by the system.

FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing a commission rate update process in the process in detail.

[Explanation of symbols]

1 ... Travel agency 1a ... Tokyo travel agency
1b ... Nagoya Travel Agency 1c ... Okinawa Travel Agency 2,12,22,32 ... PC 3 ... Web Server 4 ... Database
11: Organized travel agency 21: Customer 31: Material agency
40… Homepage 45… Card 47… Bank
W… Network

Claims (7)

[Claims] 1. A product or service provided by a provider of goods or services is connected to the computer of a mediator and a computer of a customer via an information communication network. A sales system for selling to the customer via the information communication network, wherein when the customer's computer is requested to provide the goods or services via the information communication network, the customer's price is transferred to the customer via the information communication network. Customer-side billing means for billing the customer side, fee-paying means for depositing a commission of the above-mentioned price to the intermediary via the information communication network in accordance with the billing by the customer-side billing means, Means for paying a cost, which is obtained by subtracting the fee from the price, to the provider via the information communication network in accordance with the charging by means. System. 2. When a request for providing the goods or services made by the customer's computer is canceled after the request, an amount obtained by subtracting a predetermined cancellation fee from the price is sent to the customer via the information communication network. Repayment means for refund, and intermediary charging for charging the intermediary via the information communication network an amount obtained by subtracting the fee equivalent of the cancellation fee from the fee according to the refund by the refund means. Means, and in response to the refund by the refund means, a provider-side charging means for charging the provider via the information communication network with an amount obtained by subtracting the cost equivalent of the cancellation fee from the cost. The sales system according to claim 1, further comprising: 3. The information communication network, wherein the provider's account,
The account of the intermediary and the account of the customer are also connected, and each of the means performs the charging, depositing, or refund by debiting or transferring the corresponding account via the information communication network. Claim 1
Or the sales system according to 2. 4. The information communication network is also connected to a computer of a credit card company having a contract with any of the provider, the intermediary, and the customer, and each of the units is connected to a computer of the credit card company. 3. The sales system according to claim 1, wherein the billing, payment, or refund is performed via the credit card company by transmitting and receiving predetermined data between the plurality of credit cards. 5. The method according to claim 1, wherein each of the means performs the charge, deposit, or refund through exchange of electronic money between the computer of the provider, the computer of the intermediary, and the computer of the customer. The sales system according to claim 1 or 2, wherein 6. The system according to claim 1, further comprising: a first changing unit configured to change a ratio of said fee to said price according to a sales amount of said goods or services by said mediator. The sales system according to any of the above. 7. The system according to claim 1, further comprising a second changing unit for changing a ratio of the fee to the price based on a command transmitted from the provider's computer via the communication line. The sales system according to any one of claims 1 to 6.