Patent Issued for Parts inventory management (USPTO 11694155): Allstate Insurance Company

2023 JUL 20 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- A patent by the inventors Marlow, Clint J. (Barrington Hills, IL, US), Riggio, John A. (Mundelein, IL, US), Trinco, Robert L. (Schaumburg, IL, US), filed on September 3, 2020, was published online on July 4, 2023, according to news reporting originating from Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx correspondents.

Patent number 11694155 is assigned to Allstate Insurance Company (Northbrook, Illinois, United States).

The following quote was obtained by the news editors from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Repair of damaged vehicles is a necessary aspect of any insurance company’s business. However, conventional systems are not necessarily efficient, nor do they capitalize on resources available to the insurance company. For instance, if a vehicle is considered a total loss, the car is often sold to a salvage yard who then may sell various parts of the vehicle. In this arrangement, the insurance company may not realize the entire value or potential uses of the usable parts on the total loss vehicle.

“Further, it is often difficult to anticipate when certain parts will be available for use in various repairs and repair shops must often wait to obtain parts needed for a repair.”

In addition to the background information obtained for this patent, NewsRx journalists also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “The following presents a simplified summary in order to provide a basic understanding of some aspects of the disclosure. The summary is not an extensive overview of the disclosure. It is neither intended to identify key or critical elements of the disclosure nor to delineate the scope of the disclosure. The following summary merely presents some concepts of the disclosure in a simplified form as a prelude to the description below.

“Aspects of the disclosure relate to systems, methods, apparatuses and computer-readable media for analyzing vehicle claim information from a vehicle that is damaged (such as a total loss vehicle) to determine one or more parts that may be removed from the vehicle for reuse. In some arrangements, the parts identified for reuse may be identified prior to removal from the vehicle and may be identified as available inventory and may include a future availability date. One or more repair shops may then request the parts available for reuse and the part may be reserved for that shop until it becomes available.

“Other features and advantages of the disclosure will be apparent from the additional description provided herein.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A parts management system for controlling inventory flow of vehicle parts comprising: a processing unit comprising a processor; and a memory unit storing computer-executable instructions, which when executed by the processing unit, cause the parts management system to: query a database to obtain information identifying at least one part of a plurality of vehicle parts to be removed from a first vehicle for reuse; execute an application for performing one or more inventory functions; determine a future availability date for the at least one part of the plurality of vehicle parts to be removed from the first vehicle for reuse; transmit information about the at least one part to be removed from the first vehicle for reuse to a computing system of at least one vehicle repair shop; receive, from the computing system of the at least one vehicle repair shop, a request to obtain the at least one part to be removed from the first vehicle for reuse in repair of a second vehicle; and transmit, to the computing system of the at least one vehicle repair shop, a confirmation that the at least one part will be transferred to the at least one vehicle repair shop on the future availability date.

“2. The parts management system of claim 1, wherein the application for performing the one or more inventory functions is executed by a parts sorting device of the parts management system.

“3. The parts management system of claim 1, further including instructions that, when executed, cause the parts management system to transmit the information about the at least one part to a parts inventory server of an entity.

“4. The parts management system of claim 3, wherein the transmitted information is accessible by the computing system of the at least one vehicle repair shop via the parts inventory server of the entity.

“5. The parts management system of claim 1, wherein the information identifying at least one part of a plurality of vehicle parts to be removed from a first vehicle for reuse is based on insurance claim information identifying damage to particular portions of the first vehicle.

“6. The parts management system of claim 1, further including instructions that, when executed, cause the parts management system to receive an indication that the at least one part matches an identified need of an entity.

“7. The parts management system of claim 1, further including instructions that, when executed, cause the parts management system to receive identification of the first vehicle as a total loss.

“8. A parts management system for controlling inventory flow of vehicle parts, comprising: a processing unit comprising a processor; and a memory unit storing computer-executable instructions, which when executed by the processing unit, cause the parts management system to: query a database to obtain information corresponding to damage to a first vehicle and information identifying the first vehicle as a total loss; receive information identifying at least one part of a plurality of vehicle parts of the first vehicle to be removed from the first vehicle for reuse; execute an application for performing one or more inventory functions; transmit information about the at least one part to be removed to computing systems of a plurality of vehicle repair shops; receive, from a computing system of a first vehicle repair shop, a request to obtain the at least one part for use in a repair of a second vehicle; and transmit, to the computing system of the requesting first vehicle repair shop, a confirmation that the at least one part will be transferred to the requesting first vehicle repair shop on a future availability date.

“9. The parts management system of claim 8, further including instructions that, when executed, cause the parts management system to receive an indication that the at least one part matches an identified need.

“10. The parts management system of claim 9, wherein the identified need is based on historical data.

“11. The parts management system of claim 8, further including instructions that, when executed, cause the parts management system to transmit the information about the at least one part to be removed to a parts inventory server.

“12. The parts management system of claim 11, wherein the parts inventory server is accessible by the plurality of vehicle repair shops.

“13. The parts management system of claim 8, wherein the second vehicle is associated with an entity associated with the first vehicle.

“14. The parts management system of claim 8, further including removing the at least one part from the first vehicle.

“15. The parts management system of claim 14, further including using the removed at least one part from the first vehicle in the repair of the second vehicle.

“16. A method for controlling inventory flow of vehicle parts, comprising: querying, by a parts management system having at least one processor, a database to obtain information identifying at least one part of a plurality of vehicle parts to be removed from a first vehicle for reuse; executing, by the parts management system, an application for performing one or more inventory functions; transmitting, by the parts management system, information about the at least one part to be removed from the first vehicle for reuse to a computing system of at least one vehicle repair shop; receiving, from the computing system of the at least one vehicle repair shop and by the parts management system, a request to obtain the at least one part to be removed from the first vehicle for use in repair of a second vehicle; and transmitting, by the parts management system and to the computing system of the at least one vehicle repair shop, a confirmation that the at least one part will be transferred to the at least one vehicle repair shop on a future availability date.

“17. The method of claim 16, wherein the application for performing the one or more inventory functions is executed by a parts sorting device of the parts management system.

“18. The method of claim 16, further including transmitting, by the parts management system, the information about the at least one part to a parts inventory server.

“19. The method of claim 18, wherein the transmitted information is accessible by the computing system of the at least one vehicle repair shop via the parts inventory server.

“20. The method of claim 16, further including receiving, by the parts management system, an indication that the at least one part matches an identified need of an entity.”

URL and more information on this patent, see: Marlow, Clint J. Parts inventory management. U.S. Patent Number 11694155, filed September 3, 2020, and published online on July 4, 2023. Patent URL (for desktop use only): https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/external.html?q=(11694155)&db=USPAT&type=ids

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