Time accounting system, in particular for parking subject to charge

Claim 1

A time accounting system comprising a card (10) and a case (20); said card having an electronic memory (12) with memory locations, each of the memory locations representing a time unit credit allocated to the holder of the card, and each memory location thereof adapted to be individually and irreversibly written, and coupling means (11) for accessing the memory; said case (20) having a clock circuit (26), a writing circuit (27), coupling means (21) for receiving the card and cooperating with the coupling means of the card for enabling a link to be established with the circuits of the case, said writing circuit (27) including means for irreversible writing on the memory locations in the electronic memory (12) of the card (10) received into the case, said writing circuit (27) being periodically triggered under the control of the clock circuit (26) for successively writing the card memory locations and corresponds to gradual consumption, as time elapses, of the time unit credits remaining in the card, and, means (28) for temporarily storing time unit credits, said temporary storing means (28) being activable by said writing circuit (27) in substitution of said electron memory (12) of the card (10) in response to the remaining number of unwritten memory locations representing time unit credits in the card inserted into the case being less than a pre-determined quantity.

Claim 8

The system of one of claims 1 to 4 or 1 wherein the means for temporary storing of a time unit credit comprises: means (28) for counting a time unit debit balance, means (61) for periodically determining whether there is a non-written memory location in the card (10) and, in the affirmative, for writing this location in the memory (12) or, in the negative, for incrementing the counting means (28), and means (62) for detecting and indicating the overrun by the counting means on a limit value corresponding to a maximum authorized debit time unit, after complete consumption of the card inserted into the case, in order that the user be given the opportunity to park beyond the time unit credit corresponding to the card entered into the case.

Claim 10

The system of one of claims 1 to 4 or 1 wherein the means (28) for temporary storage of a time unit credit comprises: reversible counting means (28) forming a time unit buffer, means (71) for periodically decrementing this counter under the control of a clock circuit (26, 70) gradually as time elapses, means (72) for determining, on each of these decrementations, whether the card (10) has an unwritten memory location and in the affirmative, writing (73) this location in the memory (12) and incrementing again the counter (28) in a concomitant manner, and means (75) for detecting and indicating the overrun, in incrementation direction, of a limit value corresponding to maximum authorized debit time units after complete consumption of the card inserted into the case, in order that the user can be given the opportunity to park beyond the time unit credit corresponding to the card inserted into the case.

Claim 12

The system of one of the claims 1-4 or 1 wherein the card is of the micro-circuit type card therein including, in addition to its memory (12), means (13) for addressing and controlling this memory.

Claim 13

The system of one of the preceding claims 1-4 or 1 wherein the case (10) comprises in addition a self-test device and means (22) for displaying a negative result of this self-test.

Claim 15

The system of any one of the claims 1-4 or 15 wherein: (1) the case further comprises: means (23, 24) for user entry, after positioning of the card (10) in the case (20), of a parameter representative of the place of use of the time unit credit, an account memory (29), cooperating with the writing circuit (27) and the entry means (23, 24), to record on each withdrawal card accounting data comprising the parameter code (29 1 ) representative of the place of use and/or the associated (29 2 ) number of memory locations written between the moment of the card positioning in the case and that of its withdrawal therefrom, in order that the case can store gradually, upon successive uses, data to permit subsequent imputing of the consumed time units to a definite beneficiary related to the place where the units were consumed, counting means (25) for incrementing the state of at least one operation counter (28) upon the successive system operations while these incrementations can notably be made as a function of the number of memory locations written into the successive cards inserted into the case and/or the elapsed time since the insertion of the first card into the case, means (81) for inhibiting the internal circuits of the case, activated in response to the overrun (80) of a predetermined reference value by at least one of said operation counters (28), in order to render impossible any use of the case by its holder once this overrun has occurred thus compelling the holder to periodically request restoring of the case against transfer contained therein to an external device (30) of the accounting data, means (22) for displaying the activated or inactivated state of these inhibiting means (65), and auxiliary coupling means (21), accessible from outside the case, to these storage means, (2) the system further comprises: (c) a transfer device (30) receiving the case and comprising: coupling means (31) designed to cooperate with the case auxiliary coupling means (21) so as to permit the establishing of a link between the internal circuits (32, 33) of the transfer device (30) and the case account memory (29), means (32) for reading (83) the contents of the account memory of the case, an account memory (33) receiving, in a cumulative manner, the contents of the account memories (29) of the different cases (20) inserted successively into the transfer device, means (32) for resetting to zero (82) the case account memory (29) after reading and transfer of its data into the transfer device memory (30), in order to transfer the account data from a plurality of cases into the transfer device and thereby allow subsequent determination for each beneficiary of a ratio proportional to the number of time units consumed and the distribution to each of them of a fraction of the sales product of the cards depending on this ratio, means (32) for disabling the case (85) inhibiting means (81) and resetting (85) to zero the case operation counter(s) activated after reading and transfer of data from the case account memory (29) into the transfer device memory, in order to restore the operation of the case once the holder has transferred the data from the account memory into the memory of a transfer device.