JP2003345875A - Seat reservation managing method using mobile telephone with gps function - Google Patents

Abstract

<P>PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To efficiently provide vacant seats for users. <P>SOLUTION: When a request to reserve a seat is sent to a reservation center server from a mobile telephone with a GPS function, the reservation center server judges whether there is a vacant seat. When no vacant seat is available, the reservation center server registers a starting place, a destination, and the telephone number of the mobile telephone in a cancel waiting list. When a cancel is made, the reservation center server retrieves a mobile telephone whose starting place and destination are the same with the canceled seat and which is closest to the reservation center by using the GPS function of the mobile telephone. Then the reservation center server informs the retrieved mobile telephone that a vacant seat becomes available. <P>COPYRIGHT: (C)2004,JPO

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

The present invention relates to a seat reservation management method, and more particularly to a seat reservation management method using a mobile phone with a GPS function.

[0002]

2. Description of the Related Art Airplane tickets, train tickets, etc., are vacant due to cancellation or the like.
It is important to sell these empty seats efficiently.

[0003] For this reason, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2002-92440 discloses a method of registering a wait for cancellation from a user terminal in a queue and, when a cancel occurs, reserving cancellation free information to the user terminal according to the queue. Discloses a reservation management device for inquiring of the necessity of the reservation.

[0004]

As described above,
In the conventional reservation management device, whether or not a reservation is necessary is inquired according to a queue. For this reason, even when a user is actually located far from the airport or station, the inquiry is made in the order of waiting for cancellation. Therefore, for example, when an airplane takes off (or departs from a train) one hour later, an inquiry may be sent to a user in a remote place, and it may not be possible to efficiently provide the user with vacant seats.

An object of the present invention is to efficiently provide vacant seats to a user.

[0006]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION In order to achieve the above object, the present invention relates to a mobile telephone having a GPS function, which is used when a seat reservation is made in a reservation center server.
The server determines whether there is an empty seat. If there is no vacant seat, the departure place, the destination, and the telephone number of the mobile phone are registered in the reservation waiting list in the reservation center server. When the cancellation occurs, the reservation center server searches for the mobile phone closest to the reservation center using the GPS function of the mobile phone because the departure place and the destination are the same as the canceled seat. Then, it notifies that a vacant seat has occurred in the mobile phone searched from the reservation center server.

[0007] According to the above, the vacant seat can be notified in consideration of the current position of the user, so that the vacant seat can be efficiently provided to the user.

[0008]

Embodiments of the present invention will be described below with reference to the drawings.

FIG. 1 is a system configuration diagram of the present invention.
In FIG. 1, reference numeral 10 denotes a mobile phone with a GPS function owned by a user, and reference numeral 20 denotes a reservation center server installed at a reservation center for air tickets, tickets, and the like. These are connected via a network 30.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart of a reservation process according to the present invention. When the user makes a reservation inquiry using the mobile phone with GPS function 10 (step 200), the reservation center server 20 determines whether there is a vacant seat via the network 30 (step 210). If there is no vacant seat, the reservation center server 20 makes an inquiry to the mobile phone 10 with GPS function as to whether or not to wait for cancellation via the network 30 (step 22).
0). In the mobile phone 10 with GPS function, the user inputs whether or not to wait for cancellation, and if not, ends the process. On the other hand, when the mobile phone 10 with the GPS function responds to the cancellation wait, the cancellation wait list 40
Register with.

FIG. 3 shows a cancel waiting list 3 of the present invention.
0 is shown. As shown in FIG. 3, a field for registering a user's mobile phone, a field for registering a departure point and a destination in a user's airline ticket or ticket, and a status of cancellation wait are registered in the cancellation wait list 30. Field. In step 250, the number of the user's mobile phone, the departure point and the destination in the user's airline ticket or ticket, and “cancel wait” are registered in the cancel wait list 40 as the cancel wait status. On the other hand, if there is a vacant seat in step 210, the number of the user's mobile phone, the departure point and the destination in the user's ticket or ticket, and the "cancelled" as the cancellation waiting status are included in the cancellation waiting list 40. Register

FIG. 4 is a flowchart of a process when a cancel occurs according to the present invention. If a cancellation occurs,
The departure place and the destination are the same as the canceled seats in the reservation center server 20, and the GP of the mobile phone 10
Using the S function, the mobile phone 10 closest to the reservation center server 20 is searched for, although "cancel wait" is registered as the cancel wait status in the cancel wait list 40 (step 400). Then, the reservation center server 20 notifies the searched mobile phone 10 that a vacancy has occurred (step 410).

When the mobile phone 10 responds to "reserve", "reserved" is registered as a cancel wait status in the entry of the cancel wait list 40 corresponding to the mobile phone.

On the other hand, when the mobile phone 10 receives a response of "do not make a reservation", "cancel wait release" is registered as an cancel wait status in the entry of the cancel wait list 40 corresponding to this mobile phone.

Thereafter, the reservation center server 20 determines whether or not there are still vacant seats (step 440). If there is no vacant seat, the process ends. If there is, the process returns to step 400.

As described above, in the present embodiment, an inquiry is made as to whether or not to make a reservation in ascending order of the distance between the mobile phone 10 and the reservation center server 20. If the user is far away, a mobile phone to be inquired may be selected based on the distance from the station or airport to the mobile phone.

Further, the user selects "a mobile phone to make an inquiry based on the time required to go to the station or the airport from the place where the mobile phone 10 is located, instead of the distance from the station or the airport to the mobile phone 10". Is also good.

[0018]

According to the present invention, vacant seats can be efficiently provided to the user.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a system configuration diagram of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a flowchart of a reservation process according to the present invention.

FIG. 3 is a diagram of a cancellation waiting list according to the present invention.

FIG. 4 is a flowchart of a process when a cancel occurs according to the present invention.

[Explanation of symbols]

10: mobile phone with GPS function, 20: reservation center server, 30: network, 40: cancellation waiting list.

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Claims (1)

[Claims] 1. A seat reservation management method in a system in which a mobile phone with a GPS function and a reservation center server are connected via a network, in response to a request to purchase a ticket from the mobile phone. The reservation center server determines whether or not there is a vacant seat, and, if there is no vacancy, registers the departure place, destination, and the telephone number of the mobile phone in the reservation center server in a cancel wait list, and cancels. The reservation center
In the server, the departure place and the destination are the same as the canceled seat, and using the GPS function of the mobile phone,
A seat reservation management method comprising: searching for a mobile phone closest to a reservation center; and notifying that a vacancy has occurred in the searched mobile phone from the reservation center server.