Creating group orders through geofencing

• US 10,380,535 B1
• Filed: 12/07/2015
• Issued: 08/13/2019
• Est. Priority Date: 12/07/2015
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Amazon Technologies, Inc. (Amazon.com, Inc.)
• Inventors: Arora, Siddharth, Polyanskiy, Ruslan Anatolyevich, Alkarmi, Ashraf, Gureja, Neha, Lopez, Gustavo Euduardo, Uppuluri, Pawan Lata
• Primary Examiner(s): Hayes, Ashford S
• Application Number:
  US14/961,451
• Time in Patent Office: 1,345 Days
• Field of Search: 705 15
• CPC Class Codes: G01S 5/0289 of multiple transceivers, e.g. in ad hoc networks
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/0835 Relationships between shipper or supplier and carriers
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/12 Hotels or restaurants

Abstract

Disclosed are various embodiments for an order management service. Orders may be correlated with an existing order to create a group order. The group order may include items picked up or delivered to the same or geographically proximate locations. Incentives may be used to incite participation in a group order, thereby saving on overall delivery costs.

Claims

1. A system, comprising:

at least one computing device configured to at least;

determine at least one geographically proximate client falling within a geographic boundary relative to a first client;

communicate a solicitation to the at least one geographically proximate client to submit, for addition to a group order including a first order, at least one second order, the first order and the at least one second order corresponding to a same delivery route in the group order;

generate, in response to a request to add the at least one second order to the group order, the group order;

determine that an addition of the at least one second order to the group order does not exceed a group order capacity threshold for at least one fulfillment provider, the group order capacity threshold comprising a restriction on a quantity of pending orders for the at least one fulfillment provider;

apply to at least one user account corresponding to the first client or the at least one geographically proximate client, an incentive for participating in the group order;

determine at least one time to communicate the first order or the at least one second order to a corresponding the at least one fulfillment provider, wherein the at least one time is based at least in part on an estimated travel time between a current location of a courier and a pickup location of the corresponding at least one fulfillment provider;

communicate the first order and the at least one second order to the corresponding at least one fulfillment provider at the at least one time; and

wherein the first order and the at least one second order are associated with a preparation time by the corresponding at least one fulfillment provider.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to at least determine the geographic boundary relative to a delivery location of the first order.

3. The system of claim 1, wherein the solicitation comprises at least one of a text message, an email message, or a push notification.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein communicating the solicitation comprises modifying a user interface encoded for rendering by the at least one geographically proximate client to include a user interface element facilitating a creation of the at least one second order.

5. The system of claim 4, wherein an interaction with the user interface element generates the at least one second order as comprising contents of the first order.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein the incentive comprises at least one of a discount, a waiver of an order minimum, a waiver of a delivery fee, or a promotional discount on a future order.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to restrict the at least one second order to at least one geographically proximate fulfillment provider relative to a fulfillment provider of the first order.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to at least take an alternative action responsive to the group order failing to satisfy at least one of a minimum number of participants or a minimum order amount.

9. The system of claim 8, wherein the alternative action comprises at least one of:

withholding an application of the incentive, a division of the group order into a plurality of separate orders comprising the first order and the at least one second order or communicating a notification to the first order or the at least one second order indicating an ineligibility for the group order.

10. A non-transitory computer-readable medium embodying a program executable in at least one computing device, wherein, when executed, the program causes the at least one computing device to least:

enable a group order associated with a first order in response to receiving the first order from a first client;

determine at least one geographically proximate client falling within a geographic boundary relative to the first client;

receive a request for at least one second order to join the group order, wherein the at least one second order being associated with the at least one geographically proximate client, and the group order comprises the first order;

determine that an addition of the at least one second order to the group order exceeds a group order capacity threshold for a quantity of pending orders for at least one fulfillment provider;

process the first order and the at least one second order individually in response to the determination that the addition of the at least one second order to the group order exceeds the group order capacity threshold for the at least one fulfillment provider, wherein the first order and the at least one second order are removed from the group order;

communicate the first order and the at least one second order to the at least one fulfillment provider; and

wherein the first order and the at least one second order are associated with a preparation time by the at least one fulfillment provider.

11. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 10, wherein the at least one computing device is further configured to at least determine the geographic boundary relative to a delivery location of the first order.

12. The non-transitory computer-readable medium of claim 10, wherein receiving the request for the at least one second order to join the group order occurs in response to communicating a solicitation to the at least one geographically proximate client to submit the at least one second order, communicating the solicitation comprises modifying a user interface encoded for rendering by the at least one geographically proximate client to include a user interface element facilitating a creation of the at least one second order.

13. A method, comprising:

determining, via at least one computing device, at least one geographically proximate client falling within a geographic boundary relative to a first client;

communicating, via the at least one computing device, a solicitation to the at least one geographically proximate client to submit, for addition to a group order including a first order, at least one second order, the first order and the at least one second order corresponding to a same delivery route in the group order;

generating, via the at least one computing device, in response to a request to add the at least one second order to the group order, the group order;

determining, via the at least one computing device, that an addition of the at least one second order to the group order does not exceed a capacity threshold for at least one fulfillment provider, the capacity threshold comprising a restriction on a quantity of pending orders for the at least one fulfillment provider;

applying, via the at least one computing device, to at least one user account corresponding to the first client or the at least one geographically proximate client, an incentive for participating in the group order;

determining, via the at least one computing device, at least one time to communicate the first order or the at least one second order to a corresponding at least one fulfillment provider, wherein the at least one time is based at least in part on an estimated travel time between a current location of a courier and a pickup location of the corresponding at least one fulfillment provider;

communicating, via the at least one computing device, the first order and the at least one second order to the corresponding at least one fulfillment provider at the at least one time; and

wherein the first order and the at least one second order are associated with a preparation time by the corresponding at least one fulfillment provider.

14. The method of claim 13, further comprising determining, via the at least one computing device, the geographic boundary relative to a delivery location of the first order.

15. The method of claim 13, wherein the solicitation comprises at least one of a text message, an email message, or a push notification.

16. The method of claim 13, wherein communicating the solicitation comprises modifying a user interface encoded for rendering by the at least one geographically proximate client to include a user interface element facilitating a creation of the at least one second order.

17. The method of claim 13, wherein the incentive comprises at least one of a discount, a waiver of an order minimum, a waiver of a delivery fee, or a promotional discount on a future order.

18. The method of claim 13, further comprising receiving, via the at least one computing device, a request to add a third order to the group order, wherein the request transmitted by a second client device and the request includes an identifier associated with the group order, the identifier comprising a hash value.

19. The method of claim 18, further comprising adding, via the at least one computing device, the third order to the group order based at least in part on the identifier of the request corresponding to a group order identifier.

20. The method of claim 13, further comprising determining, via the at least one computing device, that the group order satisfies a group order condition after a predefined time from a submission of the first order, wherein the group order condition comprises a minimum quantity of participants or a minimum quantity of orders.