METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR MONITORING AN ORDER STATUS

• US 20090144109A1
• Filed: 10/30/2008
• Published: 06/04/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 10/30/2007
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Electrolux Consumer Products Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Electrolux Home Products Incorporated (AB Electrolux)
• Inventors: Knight, Jared
• Granted Patent: US 8,160,971 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/7
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/08 Logistics, e.g. warehousing, loading or distribution; Inventory or stock management
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/083 Shipping
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0834 Choice of carriers
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 20/203 Inventory monitoring
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0283 Price estimation or determination
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0603 Catalogue ordering
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/0629 for generating comparisons

Abstract

A computerized system and method for monitoring an order placed by a customer for a product produced by a supplier to be delivered to a retail location. The method includes presenting an order-entry interface to collect order information about the order to be transmitted to the supplier and store the order information in a computer-accessible order database. Warehouse information authorized by the supplier and transmitted to the warehouse is also stored. A carrier database stores a shipping rate of carriers for transporting the product ordered by the customer to the retail location, and a report generation subsystem collects at least a portion of the order information, the warehouse information and the shipping rate and generates a report displaying the collected information in a single display to be substantially simultaneously reviewed by a supervisor.

Claims

1. A method of monitoring a status of an order placed by a customer for a product produced by a supplier to be delivered to a retail location, the method comprising:

collecting order information about the order from a computer-accessible order database included as part of an order routing system of the supplier and associating the order information with the order, wherein the order information includes information that identifies at least one of;

the product to be delivered, a quantity of the product desired to be delivered, and a requested ship date;

collecting warehouse information from a computer-accessible warehouse database in communication with a warehouse management system and associating the warehouse information with the order, wherein the warehouse information comprises at least one of;

a scheduled load date, a scheduled date of departure of the product from the warehouse, and a scheduled date of delivery of the product to the retail location;

associating with the order, a low-cost carrier offering a lowest shipping rate relative to shipping rates offered by a group of available carriers for transporting the quantity of the product to the retail location;

generating a report that displays the order information, the warehouse information, the low-cost carrier and the lowest shipping rate associated with the order corresponding to a predetermined time; and

transmitting the report to be viewed in real-time by a supervisor.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of collecting order information comprises retrieving the order information from the computer-accessible order database maintained on behalf of the supplier over a wide-area communication network.

3. The method of claim 1, wherein the step of collecting warehouse information comprises retrieving the warehouse information from the computer-accessible warehouse database maintained on behalf of the warehouse over a wide-area communication network.

4. The method of claim 1, wherein collecting the order information, collecting the warehouse information and associating with the order, a low-cost carrier are all performed substantially simultaneously.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein collecting the order information, collecting the warehouse information and associating with the order, a low-cost carrier are periodically performed at regular intervals.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein generating the report is performed during each regular interval and the order information, warehouse information and low-cost carrier are refreshed when the report is generated.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the report is customizable to display a portion of at least one of the order information and the warehouse information desired by the supervisor.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein generating the report comprises providing a visual indication associated with the order that the lowest shipping rate exceeds a shipping rate previously identified by at least one of the supplier and the warehouse as an acceptable shipping rate.

9. The method of claim 1 further comprising filtering a plurality of orders as a function of one or more dates selected from:

a ship date requested by the customer, the scheduled load date, the scheduled date of departure of the product from the warehouse, and the scheduled date of delivery of the product to the retail location.

10. A computerized system for fulfilling an order placed by a customer for a product produced by a supplier to be delivered to a retail location, the computerized system comprising:

an order-routing subsystem for presenting an order-entry interface to collect order information about the order to be transmitted to the supplier and store the order information in a computer-accessible order database;

a warehouse management subsystem comprising a computer-accessible warehouse database for storing warehouse information authorized by the supplier and transmitted to the warehouse storing a sufficient quantity of the product ordered by the customer, wherein the warehouse information comprises at least one of;

a scheduled load date, a scheduled date of departure of the product from the warehouse, and a scheduled date of delivery of the product to the retail location;

a carrier subsystem comprising a carrier database storing a shipping rate of a plurality of carriers for transporting the product ordered by the customer to the retail location; and

a report generation subsystem for collecting at least a portion of the order information, the warehouse information and the shipping rate and generating a report displaying the portion of the order information, the warehouse information and the shipping rate collected in a single display to be substantially simultaneously reviewed by a supervisor.

11. The computerized system of claim 10, wherein the report generation subsystem collects the portion of the order information, the warehouse information and the shipping rate periodically, at regular intervals, and updates the report to reflect changes to the portion of the order information, the warehouse information and the shipping rate that have occurred subsequent to generation of a previous report.

12. The computerized system of claim 10, wherein the carrier subsystem conducts a comparison of the shipping rate of each of the plurality of carriers stored in the carrier database and generates an alert if a lowest shipping rate of the plurality of carriers is greater than a predetermined maximum shipping rate that can be accepted by the supplier without personal authorization.

13. The computerized system of claim 10, wherein the report generated by the report generation subsystem is transmitted over a communication network to be displayed by a supervisory computer and includes a field allowing manual information entry to be stored in at least one of the computer-accessible order database and the computer-accessible warehouse database.

14. The computerized system of claim 13, wherein the field is a text entry field for receiving a text entry entered with the supervisory computer.

15. The computerized system of claim 10, wherein the order-routing subsystem and the warehouse management subsystem are operatively connected to communicate electronically over at least one of a private communication network and a public communication network.