WARRANTY TRANSACTION SYSTEM AND METHOD

A warranty transaction system (30) includes a user interface (32) that receives a warranty request from a customer computer (20) using a communications network (12). The warranty request indicates an item a customer desires to cover under a warranty. The warranty transaction system (30) also includes a warranty generation engine (34) that generates one or more warranty packages that are consistent with the warranty request. The warranty packages are created according to one or more rules. The user interface (32) communicates the warranty packages to the customer computer (20), receives a selection of at least one warranty package from the customer computer (20), and communicates the selected warranty package to one or more warranty provider computers (40) using the communications network (12). In a more particular embodiment, the user interface (32) receives bids on the selected warranty package from one or more warranty provider computers (40) and communicates the bids to the customer computer (20). The user interface (32) receives an acceptance of a bid from the customer computer (20) and communicates the acceptance to the warranty provider computer (40) that communicated the accepted bid.