WO2001015044A1

WO2001015044A1 - Method and system for perpetual service contract aggregation

Info

Publication number: WO2001015044A1
Application number: PCT/US2000/022931
Authority: WO
Inventors: Djordje Jankovic; Mircea Florin Mihaescu
Original assignee: Evulkan, Inc.
Priority date: 1999-08-23
Filing date: 2000-08-21
Publication date: 2001-03-01
Also published as: AU6793600A

Abstract

A computer based method and system provides for aggregating service contracts (402) through a service contract aggregator (200), thereby providing a volume discount pricing to buyers of services. Preferably, the price of the services decreases with the necessary number of buyers.

Description

METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR PERPETUAL SERVICE CONTRACT AGGREGATION

Field of Invention This invention relates generally to a method and system for perpetual aggregation of service contracts.

Background of the Invention

The concept of a buying club is one where an organization negotiates volume discounts or gets lower wholesale prices from vendors or service providers based on the number of buyers in the pool. The economics behind buying clubs are generally as follows: discounts go up or wholesale prices go down due to the reduced marketing expense for merchants in reaching these buyers, efficiency in manufacturing or service delivery (e.g. due to the large fixed cost of building telecommunication networks, cost per unit of bandwidth goes down rapidly as more bandwidth is used; the same applies to computer chips where aplant, a "fab", might cost billions of dollars and the higher the number of chips produced the larger the profit), and better planning (e.g. usage of the network or lower inventory storage costs). It is well known that buying clubs such as COSTCO™, Price Club™ or the

Sam's Club™ negotiate discounts for products and services they sell to their members based on the number of members they have in the buying pool (or volume of purchases). Yet another example is when associations and affinity groups (e.g. American Association of Retired Persons, American Medical Association, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Chambers of Commerce) offer discounted services to their members. For the same reasons, large corporations get better rates on purchases of computers or health insurance than smaller companies and individuals. Usually these programs are limited since they either negotiate discounts based on the current numbers of members or based on estimated product acceptance levels. Prior art volume discount programs are also limited by their reach: they are focused only on their discrete membership base (people belonging to a certain company, certain religious group, certain profession, certain affinity group or those who pay to become members of the club). Often these programs are further limited by their location (e.g. if one lives close to the local Price Club ™ store).

Internet solutions have been proposed to advance the state of volume discount pricing strategies, most notably, www.accompany.com and www.mercata.com, which have attempted to solve the limitation of physical location by using the buying cycle concept to sell products such as computer hardware, consumer electronics, or sporting goods over the Internet. Such paradigms, however, are predicted on the aggregation of buyers during a buying cycle of a specified length, upon completion of which the product is shipped to the buyers. The price of the product depends on the number of buyers who signed up during the buying cycle (and applies only to those whose offered price was lower than the sale price, in case of, say, www.mercata.com). The key limitation to this model is that the buying cycle needs to end in order to close the transaction and ship the product, thus providing for a natural target which market is products and not services. Accordingly, attempts to overcome various buying club limitations result in a separate limitation whereby buyers need to wait for the cycle to end before receiving the product, which is inefficient from a sales standpoint because ideally, buying cycles should be very short in order to avoid a wait for the customer i.e. to allow him to buy on impulse. Another limitation in the prior art is that when the same product is sold the next time, aggregation starts from zero again and optimally, buying cycles should be very long in order to aggregate a large number of buyers and reduce the price further. Thus, recent prior art attempts are constrained by these two conflicting requests.

Summary of the Invention One object of this invention is to provide a method of creation of a potentially, perpetual buying club which not only overcomes the prior art limitations, but also provides a mechanism for selling services.

In accordance with the contemplated system, a buyer places an order at a price/discount which is based on the current number of aggregated buyers (service contracts). As more buyers join, the price a buyer is paying for an on-going service (e.g. monthly, etc.) decreases, (assuming the previous contract is still valid). This leads to on-going and increasing discounts for as long as the service lasts, i.e. until either party cancels the contract. All buyers in the buying pool, therefore, benefit from all future price reductions on the service, for potentially unlimited periods of time ("perpetually"). As such, the present invention eliminates abuying cycle and provides for a true buying club. Because buyers can join at any time and can start receiving the service without waiting for some buying cycle to be completed consumers can buy on impulse, or at any other time when it makes sense, and, accordingly, the price of the service will go down thereafter as more and more buyers join.

Another aspect of the invention is to provide a system for the above method using a computer network and any carrier wave system for interconnections, e.g. the Internet, or within a telecommunications system, e.g. POTS (plain old telephone system). Yet another aspect of the invention provides a consolidated billing system for paying for one or multiple services purchased within the system on the same bill. Yet another aspect of the invention provides for selling products or services at a list price, but offering coupons (cash rebates or discounts) that can be used within a buying club or in any other online or offline store: for purchases or redemption in cash. Dollar value of a coupon or the percentage discount that it carries would go up as more buyers join, whether perpetual, in the sense of recurring monthly, or even more frequently (i.e. real time, or daily/hourly intervals) and may even be applied to both products and services.

Brief Description of the Drawings Fig. 1 is an overview of an exemplary service contract aggregation system.

Fig. 2 is an overview of a flowchart describing an exemplary business process for the service contract aggregation system.

Fig. 3 is an overview of a flowchart describing an exemplary process by which a service buyer proceeds through the selection and ordering service. Fig. 4 is an exemplary embodiment of the modules of a physical configuration of a system for service contract aggregation.

Fig. 5 is an example of a stepwise progression of dynamic pricing and resulting rebate blocs.

Detailed Description

Referring now to the drawings, Fig. 1 illustrates one embodiment of the present invention.

As shown in Fig. 1, one or several Service Providers (SPs) 100 have contracts 402 with a central Service Contract Aggregating Company (SCA) 200 to provide services with a configurable service description ("Service Description") 404 and provide service prices or volume discounts 400 (for purposes of this specification "provider service prices" and "volume discount prices" shall mean the same thing) for Service Buyers (SBs) 300 preferably within a framework such that the volume discount or the wholesale price are dependent on the aggregated number of SBs 300 or service usage during the service period. Configurable service description 404 comprises of one or more dependent or independent parameters. Because this system connects parties such that SPs 100 are provided access to multiple, and potentially a large number of SBs 300 through a single, main transaction with the SCA 200, marketing expense will be reduced and market share increased. Accordingly provided for, company resources will be more efficiently utilized such that volume discounts 400 will rise as the number of SBs 300 or service usage (i.e., services purchased for use) rises and aggregated prices 500 will fall as the number of SBs 300 or services usage rises.

The preferred function of SCA 200 is to provide an aggregated price 500 for services (based on the aggregated number of SBs 300 or service usage, and unit pricing 400 as specified in a service contract 402) and the service selection process 504 (based on service description 404 which is described in service contract 402), whereby the SB 300 selects the type and, potentially, quantity of service(s) desired which are generally offered to each of the multiple SBs 300 at the same predetermined terms, such that SBs 300 benefit as a whole from the aggregated purchasing power through SCA 200, for which SCA 200 received either a commission or is able to provide the service(s) at a marked up value. Such an aggregated price 500 is derived and continually updated from the original wholesale or discounted price 400, based on a current number of SBs 300 or service usage (wherein "continually" is explicitly contemplated to mean real time, or can be within seconds, minutes, etc.) This result yields the volume discount pricing arrangement such that there is a first volume discount pricing "x" which eventually represents a "previous" price before further discounting which occurs as a percentage "off of x (or by subtracting an amount from x), once a certain number of SBs 300 has purchased or once a certain amount of service usage has accrued. Successive purchases will yield percentages (i.e. a "most recent figure") off of each "previous" price as each contractually derived benchmark (in terms of SBs 300 purchasing or usage accrual) is achieved. It should be noted that pricing "x" and percentages thereof, and subtractions from "x" discussed above, are all representative of aggregated price 500. As cross referenced with Fig. 5, one example of this process and system would be long-distance telephone service offered at 100 per minute to individual customers, but then offered by SCA 200 to SBs 300 at 90 per minute for the first 10,000 SBs 300 or units of usage, and then changes to 80 per minute at the aggregation of 10,000 SBs 300 or units of usage(i.e. at 10,000), and then changes again to 70 per minute at the aggregation of the next 10,000 SBs 300 or units of usage (i.e. at 20,000), and so on until a theoretical or practical limit C is reached.

As mentioned, the present invention provides for at least three embodiments of pricing. (1) cyclical; (2) dynamic; and (3) cyclical with a rebate/discount. All three types of pricing will allow for SB 300 to order as many or as few services as desired from SCA 200. As cross referenced with Fig. 5, and by way of example, in a cynical pricing cycle of telephone charges as depicted, the present system and method would yield, say, 90 per minute for each customer (SB 300) up to 10,000 SBs 300 (or units of usage) for each pricing cycle (which might be daily or monthly) until a benchmark threshold is reached at, say, 10,000 active customers (SBs 300) or units of usage, which will then yield 80 per minute for each customer (SB 300) or units of usage, in the next pricing cycle(s) until a different benchmark is achieved (i.e. 20,000) and so on. In dynamic pricing for example, the aggregated price 500 (whether 90, or 80, etc.) is automatically adjusted at the particular time of usage, regardless of any cycle or timeline. For purposes of the present invention, the system and method contemplated herein describe a pricing cycle (which means the time during which a given aggregated price 500 is offered to SBs 300), and an update cycle (which means the lag in time until which any change is aggregated price 500 is passed on to SBs 300). Thus, the three embodiments of pricing explicitly contemplate a "float" via the update cycle of finite duration (e.g., cyclical and cyclical with rebate/discount), or virtually no "float" via a minimal update cycle which is commercially practical (e.g., the near instantaneous update of dynamic pricing). The same system structure may also be applied to various systems, such as magazine subscriptions and the like. In magazine subscriptions, the price of Maxim™ magazine might be an already discounted $ 15/year (where the usual subscription rate is $ 18/year) for the first 50,000 subscribers, and if the number of subscribers exceeds 50,000 persons, it will decrease by $ 1/year for each additional 50,000 persons until a threshold (minimum) price of $9/year is reached, with (each succeeding year having a credit adjustment of the number of $ 1/year increments as dictated by subscriptions).

As in all embodiments, one need not give credit adjustments, but may provide monetary remuneration such as cash rebates and coupons (for redemption with a variety of vendors, if desired).

Another example might be auto insurance (or health insurance) where the price for the service depends upon the personal information of an individual SB 300 (as detailed in Fig. 3, infra), but the discounts are provided based on the total number of SBs 300. As may be readily apparent to those in the art, the present system is further applicable to goods (as well as services) where the appropriate contractually derived discounts may reflect purchases by SBs 300.

Yet another embodiment might provide for a wireless service where SCA 200 acts as, say, a reseller and might buy minutes in bulk such that the aggregated price 500(calculated from a wholesale base) might depend on usage, rather than the number of SBs 300. The predication of the discount price (i.e., aggregated price 500) made on service usage, rather than the number of SBs is explicitly contemplated to extend to all volume discounts 400 described herein for all manners of services. The actual discounts/rebates and the customer accounting herein may be configured as known in the art, or as detailed in the U.S. Patent No. Re. 36, 116, the specification of which is hereby incorporated by reference. As such, rebates may be passed on to SB 300 in various forms such as credits against future bills, monetary remuneration, or a voucher for use in purchasing goods and/or services of any merchant. In accordance with these and other billing particulars, a log or record may be maintained on a server 3030 of SCA 200 (see Fig. 4) purchases of a given set of services such that a unified billing may be presented to an SB 300 for all services purchased. SCA 200 may draw either a commission (i.e. be a sales agent) or mark up the price from the SP 100 discount to wholesaler price (i.e. resell). Of course, each SP 100 may be one of many potential suppliers of a given product.

Returning to the Figure 1, SBs 300 place orders 550, for service recipients 350 (i.e., themselves, or other designated recipient) to the SCA 200 and the SCA 200 passes the SB 300 information 450 directly to the SP 100 or to the authorized agent 150 of SP 100. SB 300 might be the recipient of the service itself or might just create a contract with SCA 200 for actual recipients of the service. One example of service recipients would be company employees receiving health insurance from the service provider, while the company itself would be SB 300 contracting with the SCA 200 for the service. Other examples of the SB 300 include recipients of the servicing involving consumers or businesses contracting for utilities (electricity, gas, water, sewage), telecommunication services (longdistance, local phone access, Internet access, cable television or access, wireless services), auto insurance, equipment leases, magazine subscriptions, office supplies or software maintenance contracts, website hosting, and credit card, loan or montage interest rates or monthly payments. By way of example, the system also contemplates the possibility of an authorized agent 150, such as a health insurance broker taking information 450 from the SB 300 and potentially passing it on to SP 100.

Although in certain embodiments SCA 200 may wish to directly provide purchased services 600, in a most preferred embodiment, depicted in Fig. 1, SP 100 provides the contracted (i.e., purchased) service 600 to SB 300 or the service recipient 350 some time after receiving SB 300 information 450. Ifanew SB 300 orders the service 600 under the same general terms and conditions through the same contract 402, the aggregated price 500 might change based on the number of SBs 300 or service 600 usage thereof, when aggregated by SCA 200. Aggregated prices 500 are derived from 400 because, for example, SCA 200 adds a mark-up or interpolates between discrete points etc. Accordingly, the SCA 200 derives aggregated prices 500 for the buyer from the prices 400 from the original arrangement made with SCA 200 while making sure that prices 500 go down as the number of buyers or service usage rises (purposes of the present invention "service usage" may mean total purchases of service by one service buyer 300 for use, whether actually used in time or not). For example, if the total number of SBs 300 exceeds a number determined by SCA 200, that event triggers increased volume discounts. It is contemplated that, as the number of SBs 300 or service 600 usage increases, the price for the service from a specific SP 100 will decrease given that the volume discounts will increase (or the wholesale price for the service will decrease).

Fig. 2 shows a flow chart illustrating a typical process for service contract aggregation. In step 610, SP 100 contract with SCA 200 to provide a service 600 based on the service description 404 and provider service price 400 which are preferably based on contractually derived or actively determined volume discount benchmarks or are wholesale prices dependant on a certain number of SBs 300 or total service usage during the service period. The contract 402 might be initiated by either SP 100 or SCA 200 but both parties will ideally negotiate a contractual system for providing services 600 via the inventive system to SBs 300. In a preferred embodiment, such contractual system will have dynamic, stepwise terms (the terms of which might be one person or one unit of usage). In step 620, SCA 200 presents via a telephone or Internet connection, a choice of configurable services 504 and aggregated service prices 500 to SB 300. Aggregated service prices 500 therefore are derived from provider service prices 400.

In step 630, SB 300 configures and selects the service 504 with its price 500 and a SP 100. These choices may be made from any convenient list as is known in the art of service provider designation forms (such as those currently provided by, say, utility deregulation committees), but will preferably comprise an online GUI menu. As indicated in step 640, SB 300 will place the order 550 for the service, price and SP 100 selected in the step 630. This will, in preferred embodiment, take place on line through the "selecting" from an electronic list wherein the SB 300 and SCA 200 are connected via connections known in the art such as a TCP/IP connection. Nevertheless, step 650 is also provided so that SCA 200 can send SB 300 or service recipient 350 information to the SP 100. Accordingly, the system of the present invention further provides for two levels of service recipients, if desired. For example, in the case of health insurance as a service, two levels of service recipients might be provided such that a small business would be a SB 300 while its employees would be service recipients 350.

Once chosen, and as detailed in step 660, SP 100 fulfills the service 600 contracted to SCA 200 by providing the ensuing delivery of services such as by providing blocks of sellable phone time units, magazine subscription credits, etc., depending on the type of service. Matching of the services with customer requests may be performed as known in the art of online order fulfillment, or as detailed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,664,1 15, the specification of which is hereby incorporated by reference. In situations involving services which are less commodity-like in nature, such as auto insurance, etc., the SP 100 may alternatively establish a direct relationship with a SB 300, but will preferably be required to pass on a portion of the sales as previously negotiated. In step 670, SCA 200 or SP 100 may charge a price to SB 300, either on an on-going basis, for an on-going use of the service 600 or up-front for a predetermined block of services. In any case it is preferable to secure payments or bills through credit card authorizations as is well known in the art, although other embodiments are further contemplated, such as billing at the end of a determined billing cycle (i.e. such as that in regular phone service), or even using a debit card or virtual checking account or regular SCA 200 pre-paid account. In accordance with the above described pricing, (and as cross-referenced with Fig. 5) in step 680, as more SB 300s order service 600 or as the usage of the service 600 increases, aggregated price 500 goes down (or discounts/rebates go up) based on service provider prices 400.

Fig. 3 shows a flow chart illustrating a typical process by which a single SB 300 goes through a service configuration 504 and price selection process of aggregated price 500 and places an order 550 with SCA 200.

In step 790, SB 300 chooses a service description 504 or a type of service from a menu (not depicted) of available services.

In step 800, SB 300 chooses a recipient or recipients 350 for the service configuration 504. Recipients 350 could, for example, be employees of a company that is contracting for their health insurance. Under certain conditions, recipients 350 could be family members or friends who have authorized a SB 300 to contract for the service configuration 504 with an SCA 200.

In step 900, SB 300 starts configuring the service configuration 504 by selecting independent configuration parameters. For example, in case of Internet access, these parameters would be access speed (bandwidth), number of lines etc. In case of auto insurance, these could be various aspects about driving record of the given SB 300. SB 300 can configure the service using various terminals 3000. Using a Web browser, configuration could be done through GUI or drop down menus where SB 300 can select one answer to a question, or by checking one or several check boxes representing answers to a question, or by typing in some information in text fields. Using a touch-tone telephone, SB 300 would be prompted, for example, to press numbers in order to chose one or several answers to questions.

In step 1000, SCA 200 determines if the requested service configuration depends on the personal information of service recipient 350. Through step 1100, SB 300 provides personal information for the service recipient 350 for the purpose of further configuring the service configuration 504. This information could be comprised of the name, address, date of birth and other information of service recipient 350, and would be provided in accordance with techniques known in the art of online information provision (which would also provide for the storage of all relevant information for simplicity and ease in future transactions, as well as for figuring in potentially additional factors when calculating a purchase price).

In step 1200, SCA 200 determines if the service configuration 504 has to be dynamically configured based on previously selected configuration parameters

900 and 1100. In step 1300, SCA 200 determines if the dynamic service parameter configuration process has ended. In step 1400, the SCA 200 dynamically generates specific service configuration parameters based on information 900, 1100 and 1500. Returning to an earlier provided example, when purchasing a service such as auto insurance, SB 300 will input (preferably via the online menu) his car make, year, etc. so as to receive a dynamically based quote on the input car information, and actuarial formulae which would be provided as known in the act of insurance quotation. Of course, the system provides for dynamic pricing in all respects, such that if a driver has had an automobile accident recently, an adjustment can be made in the discounted quote to reflect the risks and realities of individual transactions. Accordingly, in step 1500, SB 300 further inputs service configuration 504 parameters e.g. the model of his car, etc. which are then transmitted (preferably via a TCP/IP connection) to SCA 200, or even to SP 100 (either directly or indirectly via SCA 200) for presentation of fulfillment options (not shown). In a most preferred embodiment, the input parameters of service configuration 504 will be directly transmitted to SCA 200 for processing based on previously established criteria which will include, at the minimum, a pricing based on the number of SBs 300 purchasing the given service (or total service usage), and may further include actuarial (in the case of insurance concerns) geographic factors, etc. In step 1600, SCA 200 presents service configuration 504 fulfillment options based on configuration steps 900, 1100, 1400 and 1500, and in the case of insurance, etc., withSP 100 names or their authorized agent 150 names and aggregated prices 500, derived from wholesale prices or volume discounts 400 calculated by SCA 200 based on the current number of buyers 300 and/or the service usage. An example of a commodity service might be all Internet Service Providers that can provide SB 300 requested service of, say, DSL lines in, say, Levittown, Pennsylvania. Such listing of fulfillment options would ideally list the different prices.

In step 1700, SB 300 selects a service configuration 504, aggregated price 500 and SP 100 and/or the authorized agent 150 of SP 100. In step 1800, SB 300 will preferably provide identification and authentication data such as social security number, federal employer identification number (FEIN) etc.

In step 1850, SCA 200 determines, based on the configured service parameters 500, if an immediate payment is required for the selected service configuration 504. In step 1900, SB 300 provides payment information such as credit card, checking account number, billing account number, etc. which is either processed according to online credit card transactions such as those described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,794,207, the specification of which is hereby incorporated by reference. In step 1950, SCA 200 determines, based on the service configuration service 504, if acceptance of terms and conditions is required for the selected service configuration 504. In step 2000, SB 300 agrees to the terms and conditions as set by SCA 200. In step 2100, SCA 200 will send required SB 300 information 450 to the selected SP 100 and/or its authorized agent 150. In step 2200, SCA 200 will send an order confirmation to the SB 300. In step 2300, SP 100 fulfills service obligations under contract 402 with SCA 200 by delivering service 600 to the service recipient 350 some time after step 2010.

Fig. 4 illustrates one embodiment of the system for the service contract aggregation.

With the following modules of this system, SBs 300 use interactive terminals 3000 to connect over a communication network 3010 in order to access communication server 3020 of SCA 200. Interactive terminals 3000 couldbe Web browser or HTML e-mail enabled devices such as personal computers, so-called Internet appliances (devices such as Palm Pilot VII that provide Internet access), TV sets through the use of Web TV-enabled devices or cable set-top boxes, etc. Another interactive terminal couldbe atouch-tone telephone. The communication network 3010 could be any propagated wave carrier system which, in preferred embodiments, might be the Internet, plain old telephone system (POTS), wireless network, etc. for connecting the above described modules for mterconnectivity in transmission and receiving amongst the modules of the previously described method of the system.

The communication server 3020 of SCA 200 will provide remote SBs 300 with online access to services server 3030 of SCA 200. The most common example of the communication server 3020 would be a web server, such as one manufactured by Sun Microsystem of Mountain View, California (U.S.A.) Services server 3030 of SCA 200 comprises a service configurator 3040, service description and prices database 3050 and customers and orders database 3060. Service configurator 3040 will allow SBs 300 to have service configuration 504 recorded in the service description and prices database 3050. SB 300 and service recipient 300 personal information, along with orders 550, are recorded in a customers and orders database 3060. The information kept in the service description and prices database 3050 is provided by the system 3070 of SP 100 which comprises service contracts and prices database 3080 and a customers and orders database 3090 that keeps track of service fulfillment 600 as known in the art of service fulfillment, and described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,664,115 and Re. 36,116, the specification of which are hereby incorporated by reference. The information flow between services server 3030 of SCA 200 and system 3070 of SP 100, and vice versa, is accomplished via the communication network 3010 or via dedicated communication lines 3100.

The many features and advantages of the present invention are apparent from the details in this specification and thus, it is intended by the appended claims to cover all such features and advantages of the invention which fall within the true spirit and scope of the present invention.

Furthermore, since numerous modifications and variations will readily occur to those skilled in the art, it is not desired that the present invention be limited to the exact construction and operation illustrated and described herein, and accordingly, all suitable modifications and equivalents which may be resorted to are intended to fall within the scope of the claims.

Claims

We claim:

1. A computer based method for aggregating service contracts through a service contract aggregator for the practical purpose of providing volume discount pricing for purchases of services by service buyers from a service provider, said method comprising the steps of: creating an arrangement of volume discount pricing between the service provider and the service contract aggregator for at least one service; creating at least one service configuration for a service within said arrangement; providing at least one of said service buyers with at least one of said service configurations; passing on to said service buyer at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing within the service configurations provided to the service buyer; and accepting a term of payment by the service buyer for a purchase of at least one of the service configurations based on said volume discount pricing, as a purchased service.

2. The method of claim 1 wherein the passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing is a function of the service usage from at least one buyer that has purchased said purchased service.

3. The method of claim 1 wherein the passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing is a function of the number of buyers that has purchased said purchased service.

4. The method of claim 2 or 3 wherein the percentage of said volume discount pricing which is the function of said purchased service is further capable of being increased in accordance with an increase in the total purchase of said purchased service of at least one buyer that has purchased the service.

5. The method of claim 4 wherein the percentage of said volume discount pricing which is the function of said purchased service is further capable of being increased perpetually in accordance with an increase in the total usage of said purchased service of at least one buyer that has purchased the service.

6. The method of claim 5 wherein the increased percentage of said volume discount pricing provides for a rebate for said at least one buyer of said purchased service which is reflected by the difference of the most recent figure of said increased percentage of said volume discount pricing and a previous figure of said volume discount pricing.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the rebate is calculated according to a given pricing cycle.

8. The method of claim 7, wherein the rebate is passed to the service buyer in the form of a credit against a future bill.

9. The method of claim 7, wherein the rebate is passed on to the service buyer in the form of a monetary remuneration.

10. The method of claim 6 wherein the rebate may be used to buy products and services from a merchant.

11. The method of claim 4, wherein the percentage of said volume discount pricing is further capable of being offset by at least a percentage in accordance with a set of personal information communicated from said service buyer.

12. The method of claim 4, wherein the increased percentage of said volume discount pricing provides for a dynamic pricing for said at least one buyer of said purchased service which is reflected by the difference of the most recent figure of said increased percentage of said volume discount pricing and a previous figure of said volume discount pricing.

13. A computer based system for aggregating service contracts through a service contract aggregator for the practical purpose of providing volume discount pricing for purchases of services by service buyers from service provider, said system comprising: a module for creating and recording an arrangement of volume discount pricing between the service provider and the service contract aggregator for at least one service; a module for creating at least one service configuration within said arrangement; a module for providing at least one of said service buyers with at least one of said service configuration; a module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least percentage of said volume discount pricing with the service configurations provided to the service buyers; and a module for accepting a term of payment by the service buyers for purchase of at least one of the service configuration based on said volume discount pricing, as a purchased service.

14. The system of claim 13 wherein the module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a function predicated on service usage purchased.

15. The system of claim 13 wherein the module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a function predicated on number of buyers who have purchased said purchased service.

16. The system of claim 14 or 15 wherein the module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers that has purchased said service of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a function of said purchased service is capable of being increased in accordance with an increase in the amount of total usage of said at least one service buyers purchasing said purchased service.

17. The system of claim 16 wherein the module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers that has purchased said service of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a function of the total service usage of said at least one service buyer that has purchased said purchased service is capable of being increased perpetually in accordance with an increase in the amount of total usage of said at least one service buyers purchasing said purchased service.

18. The system of claim 17 wherein the module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes an increased percentage of said volume discount pricing as a basis for providing for a rebate for said buyer of said purchased service which is reflected by the difference of the most recent figure of said increased percentage of said volume discount pricing and a previous figure of said volume discount pricing.

19. The system of claim 18 wherein the module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a rebate which is calculated according to a given pricing cycle.

20. The system of claim 19 wherein the module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a rebate which is passed to the service buyer in the form of a credit against a future bill.

21. The system of claim 19 wherein the module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a rebate which is passed on to the service buyer in the form of a monetary remuneration.

22. The system of claim 18, wherein the rebate may be used to buy products and services from a merchant.

23. The system of claim 16, wherein the module for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing which utilizes a percentage of said volume discount pricing is capable of being offset by at least a percentage in accordance with a set of personal information communicated from said service buyer.

4. The system of claim 16, wherein the increased percentage of said volume discount pricing provides for a dynamic pricing for said at least one buyer of said purchased service which is reflected by the difference of the most recent figure of said increased percentage of said volume discount pricing and a previous figure of said volume discount pricing.

25. A computer based system for aggregating service contracts through a service contract aggregator for the practical purpose of providing volume discount pricing for purchases of services by service buyers from service provider, said system comprising: a means for creating an arrangement of volume discount pricing between the service provider and the service contract aggregator for at least one service; a means for creating at least one service configuration within said arrangement; a means for providing at least one of said service buyers with at least one of said service configuration; a means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least percentage of said volume discount pricing with the service configurations provided to the service buyers; and a means for accepting a term of payment by the service buyers for purchase of at least one of the service configuration based on said volume discount pricing, as a purchased service.

26. The system of claim 25 wherein the means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a function of the service usage from at least one buyer that has buyers that have purchased said purchased service.

27. The system of claim 25 wherein the means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a function of the number of buyers that have purchased said purchased service.

28. The system of claim 26 or 27 wherein the means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a function of purchased service which is capable of being increased in accordance with an increase in the amount of total usage of said at least one service buyer purchasing said purchased service.

29. The system of claim 28 wherein the means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a function of the total usage of said at least one service buyer that has purchased said purchased service which is capable of being increased perpetually in accordance with an increase in the number of total usage of said at least one service buyer purchasing said purchased service.

30. The system of claim 29 wherein the means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes an increased percentage of said volume discount pricing as a basis for providing for a rebate for said buyers of said purchased service which is reflected by the difference of the most recent figure of said increased percentage of said volume discount pricing and a previous figure of said volume discount pricing.

31. The system of claim 30, wherein the means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a rebate which is calculated according to a given pricing cycle.

32. The system of claim 31 , wherein the means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a rebate which is passed to the service buyer in the form of a credit against a future bill.

33. The system of claim 31, wherein the means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a rebate which is passed on to the service buyer in the form of a monetary remuneration.

34. The system of claim 30, wherein the rebate may be used to buy products and services from any merchant.

35. The system of claim 28, wherein the means for passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing utilizes a percentage of said volume discount pricing is capable of being offset by at least a percentage in accordance with a set of personal information communicated from said service buyer.

36. The system of claim 28, wherein the increased percentage of said volume discount pricing provides for a dynamic pricing for said at least one buyer of said purchased service which is reflected by the difference of the most recent figure of said increased percentage of said volume discount pricing and a previous figure of said volume discount pricing.

7. A computer based method for aggregating service contracts through a service contract aggregator for the practical purpose of providing volume discount pricing for purchases of services by service buyers from a service provider stored as a set of commercial data signals organized into groups and stored in a memory of the computer for transmission to a service buyer, said method comprising the service buyer being at a receiving end of the steps of: creating an arrangement of volume discount pricing between the service provider and the service contract aggregator for at least one service, and storing said arrangement as a group of arrangement data signals of the set of the commercial data signals on said computer creating at least one service configuration for a service within said arrangement, and storing said service configuration as a group of service configuration data signals of the set of the commercial data on said computer; transforming said arrangement of data signals and said service configuration data signals into for transmission to a service buyer connected with said computer; transmitting said transferred arrangement data signals and said service configuration data signals to said service buyer; accepting a term of payment by the service buyer for a purchase of at least one of the service configurations based on said volume discount pricing, as a purchased service.

38. The method of claim 37 wherein the transformed arrangement of data signals and said service configuration comprises a function for passing on to said service buyer at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing within the service configurations provided to the service buyer; passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing is a function of service usage from at least one buyer that has purchased said purchased service.

39. The method of claim 37 wherein the transformed arrangement of data signals and said service configuration comprises a function for passing on to said service buyer at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing within the service configurations provided to the service buyer; passing on to at least one of said service buyers of at least a percentage of said volume discount pricing is a function of number of buyers that has purchased said purchased service.

40. The method of claim 38 or 39 wherein the percentage of said volume discount pricing which is the function purchased service is capable of being increased in accordance with an increase in the total usage of at least one of said service buyer purchasing said purchased service.

41. The method of claim 40 wherein the percentage of said volume discount pricing which is the function of the number of service buyers that have purchased said purchased service is capable of being increased perpetually in accordance with an increase in the total usage of at least one of said service buyer purchasing said purchased service.

42. The method of claim 41 wherein the increased percentage of said volume discount pricing provides for a rebate for said buyer of said purchased service which is reflected by the difference of the most recent figure of said increased percentage of said volume discount pricing and a previous figure of said volume discount pricing.

43. The method of claim 42, wherein the rebate is calculated according to a given pricing cycle.

44. The method of claim 43, wherein the rebate is passed to the service buyer in the form of a credit against a future bill.

45. The method of claim 43, wherein the rebate is passed on to the service buyer in the form of a monetary remuneration.

46. The method of claim 42, wherein the rebate may be used to buy products and services from a merchant.

47. The method of claim 40, wherein the percentage of said volume discount pricing is further capable of being offset by at least a percentage in accordance with a set of personal information communicated from said service buyer.

48. The method of claim 40, wherein the increased percentage of said volume discount pricing provides for a dynamic pricing for said at least one buyer of said purchased service which is reflected by the difference of the most recent figure of said increased percentage of said volume discount pricing and a previous figure of said volume discount pricing.