Patent Issued for Roadside assistance system (USPTO 11972688): Allstate Insurance Company

2024 MAY 22 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Alexandria, Virginia, NewsRx journalists report that a patent by the inventors Adcock, Christopher (Henrico, VA, US), Barth, Kim (Northbrook, IL, US), filed on May 27, 2021, was published online on April 30, 2024.

The patent’s assignee for patent number 11972688 is Allstate Insurance Company (Northbrook, Illinois, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “Vehicles can become disabled during a trip because of, for example, a vehicle malfunction, an accident, etc. A disabled vehicle can be a stressful situation for an owner or operator of a vehicle. The drivers and/or passengers of the disabled vehicle can contact a towing network for assistance. In some situations, the towing network might not have available service vehicles to assist the disabled vehicle. Additionally, the towing network can dispatch a service provider located far away from the disabled vehicle.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “The following summary presents a simplified summary of certain features. The summary is not an extensive overview and is not intended to identify key or critical elements.

“Systems, apparatuses, and methods for providing roadside assistance services are described herein. The system can include network computing devices and computing devices associated with vehicles and service vehicles. Requests for roadside services can be automatically assigned to an available service provider. Service providers can be ranked based on a variety of criteria and requests can be assigned based on the ranking. The ranking of service providers can be adjusted based on the performance of the service provider. If a service provider takes too long to respond to a request, the request can be automatically declined and an alternative service provider can be selected.

“These and other features and advantages are described in greater detail below.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. An apparatus comprising: one or more processors; and memory storing instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the apparatus to: obtain request data indicating a service request at a geographic location; predict capacity for a plurality of service providers based on timing of completed service requests by each of the service providers, wherein the capacity for the plurality of service providers is based on an amount of equipment associated with each of the service providers; generate eligible service provider data based on the obtained request data, where the eligible service provider data comprises a list of the service providers predicted to have capacity, wherein the service providers on the list are ranked based on service availability of each service provider in the list of service providers and by the predicted capacity of each service provider in the list of service providers; provide a request to a first service provider system in the ranked list of service providers; and automatically update the eligible service provider data based on a response to the request.

“2. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the request data of the service request comprises a make of a vehicle, a model of the vehicle, details regarding a roadside event, and a type of requested roadside service, and wherein the ranked list of service providers is generated further based on equipment availability corresponding to the request data.

“3. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the processors execute further instructions to determine a time frame associated with the request sent to the first service provider based on a type of requested roadside service associated with the service request.

“4. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the ranked list of service providers is generated further based on historical acceptance rate specific to one or more of the geographic region or a time of the service request.

“5. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the request indicates a time frame during which the request is valid, wherein obtaining the response include automatically declining the service request on behalf of the first service provider based on expiration of the time frame.

“6. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the response to the request further includes one or more reasons for declining the request.

“7. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the ranked list of service providers is generated further based on a historical time of arrival for a service provider.

“8. The apparatus of claim 1, wherein the ranked list of service providers is generated further based on a historical acceptance or rejection of past service requests.

“9. A computer-implemented method, comprising: obtaining request data indicating a service request; predicting capacity for a plurality of service providers based on timing of completed service requests by each of the service providers, wherein the capacity for the plurality of service providers is based on an amount of equipment associated with each of the service providers; generating eligible service provider data based on the obtained request data, where the eligible service provider data comprises a list of the service providers predicted to have capacity, wherein the service providers on the list are ranked based on service availability of each service provider in the list of service providers and by the predicted capacity of each service provider in the list of service providers; providing a request to a first service provider system in the ranked list of service providers; and automatically updating the eligible service provider data based on a response to the request.

“10. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, wherein the request data of the service request comprises a make of a vehicle, a model of the vehicle, details regarding a roadside event, and a type of requested roadside service, and wherein the ranked list of service providers is generated further based on equipment availability corresponding to the request data.

“11. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, further comprising determining a time frame associated with the request sent to the first service provider based on a type of requested roadside service associated with the service request.

“12. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, wherein generating the ranked list of service providers is further based on historical acceptance rate specific to one or more of the geographic region or a time of the service request.

“13. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, wherein the request indicates a time frame during which the request is valid, wherein obtaining the response include automatically declining the service request on behalf of the first service provider based on expiration of the time frame.

“14. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, wherein the response to the request further includes one or more reasons for declining the request.

“15. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, wherein generating the ranked list of service providers is further based on a historical time of arrival for a service provider.

“16. The computer-implemented method of claim 9, wherein generating the ranked list of service providers is further based on a historical acceptance or rejection of past service requests.

“17. A non-transitory computer-readable medium storing instructions for controlling a processor, the instructions causing the processor to perform steps comprising: obtaining request data indicating a service request; predicting capacity for a plurality of service providers based on timing of completed service requests by each of the service providers, wherein the capacity for the plurality of service providers is based on an amount of equipment associated with each of the service providers; generating eligible service provider data based on the obtained request data, where the eligible service provider data comprises a list of the service providers predicted to have capacity, wherein the service providers on the list are ranked based on service availability of each service provider in the list of service providers and by the predicted capacity of each service provider in the list of service providers; providing a request to a first service provider system in the ranked list of service providers; and automatically updating the eligible service provider data based on a response to the request.

“18. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the request data of the service request comprises a make of a vehicle, a model of the vehicle, details regarding a roadside event, and a type of requested roadside service, and wherein the ranked list of service providers is generated further based on equipment availability corresponding to the request data.

“19. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 18, wherein generating the eligible service provider data is further based on a historical time of arrival for a service provider.

“20. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 17, wherein the request indicates a time frame during which the request is valid, wherein obtaining the response include automatically declining the service request on behalf of the first service provider based on expiration of the time frame.”

For additional information on this patent, see: Adcock, Christopher. Roadside assistance system. U.S. Patent Number 11972688, filed May 27, 2021, and published online on April 30, 2024. Patent URL (for desktop use only): https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/external.html?q=(11972688)&db=USPAT&type=ids

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