Patent ID: 6952681
Filing Date: 2005-10-04
Classification: G06Q

Abstract:
1. A method for tracking and controlling the distribution of controlled articles from a central inventory of a pharmaceutical company, a portion of the central inventory having been conveyed to at least one remote distributing representative of the pharmaceutical company for further distribution to distributees, the tracking and controlling being conducted in real time by means of electronic communication and data collection, comprising: a) preauthorizing a specific distribution transaction to be conducted by the distributing representative by sending a distribution request from the distributing representative for distribution of a packet of articles to a distributee, to a system server and receiving the distribution request in the system server, the request comprising a representative identifier, a distributee identifier, and a statement describing the contents of the packet of articles being distributed from the portion of the central inventory conveyed to the distributing representative; b) confirming the authority of the distributing representative to distribute the packet; c) confirming the authority of the distributee to receive the packet; d) evaluating the distribution request for meeting specific business logic specified by the pharmaceutical company; e) upon successful completion of the preceding steps, transmitting an authorization code to the distributing representative indicating to the distributing representative an authorization to conduct the specific distribution transaction, the authorization code serving as recordable proof of authorization to conduct the specific distribution transaction; f) maintaining a local inventory corresponding to the portion of central inventory remaining in the distributing representative possession by decrementing the packet's contents from the local inventory and decrementing the packet's contents from the central inventory; and g) distributing the packet to the distributee.