Abstract:
A system and method for a dispatching program and for its implementation, involves logging into a system, selecting or creating a work unit, and assigning work orders to the selected unit. After the work orders have been assigned the assignments are transmitted to each work crew.

Description:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
       [0001]    The present application relates generally to a system and method for dispatching and tracking work orders and work crews. 
         [0002]    It is known in the art to have pre-configured work crews with assigned equipment. It is also known to schedule work orders to these crews as much as several months in advance. Under such a scheduling method, it becomes unnecessary to utilize a dispatching process beyond informing the work crew of their assigned work orders. This scheduling procedure leads to inflexibility and can result in significant delays in accomplishing tasks. 
         [0003]    When a member of a crew takes off work, or must be absent, and that member is the sole member of the crew to have a vital skill (such as being a licensed driver, being a certified electrician, etc.), then any work orders requiring that skill cannot be accomplished until that crew member is either replaced or returns. This can result in a large backlog of work orders when a scheduling and dispatch system such as the one above is used. 
         [0004]    It is therefore desirable to create a system and method where work orders are not assigned to a work crew until they are ready to be dispatched. Additionally, it is desirable to create a dispatch system where a user is capable of sorting the work orders by any criteria in order to facilitate better resource management. It is additionally desirable to allow the dispatcher to assign priorities to a work order and to have those priorities remain associated with the work order throughout the entire process. 
       SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION 
       [0005]    The applicant has devised a system and method for dispatching work orders. When a user logs into a dispatch system, he is presented with an interface which allows him to perform the steps necessary to dispatch a work order. The first action taken to dispatch a particular work order is to either create a dispatchable unit, or find an available dispatchable unit. Next, the user assigns company resources and employees to the dispatchable unit creating a work crew. This process may be done multiple times, creating or finding multiple work crews in order to aide in the dispatch process. Next, the user assigns work orders to dispatchable units based on any number of criteria. Once the work orders have been assigned to work crews, the dispatch program transmits the information to a work order dispatch receiver associated with each crew. 
         [0006]    These and other aspects of the application can be best understood from the specification and drawings. Following is a brief description of the drawings. 
     
    
     
       BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS 
         [0007]      FIG. 1  is a flowchart illustrating an embodiment of the dispatch process. 
           [0008]      FIG. 2  is a sample user interface screen that is displayed in an embodiment of the dispatch process. 
           [0009]      FIG. 3  illustrates a system that could be used to implement one embodiment of the application. 
       
    
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT 
       [0010]    Disclosed is a system for dispatching work orders to specific crews and trucks and tracking their progress.  FIG. 1  illustrates an embodiment of the system that could be used when work orders have been scheduled for a specific day, but not to a specific unit prior to dispatch. Initially, a user opens a user interface and logs into the software. Some embodiments include a “varying levels of access” feature where users with a certain access level are allowed to make modifications to the scheduling of a given day, and other users are only allowed to view the status of the scheduling for a given day. The initial step in  FIG. 1  is the manage data step  110 . In the manage data step  110 , any information necessary for the dispatch software is retrieved from a database, and any information not contained in the database may be entered by a user  250 , see  FIG. 3 . After all the necessary information has been retrieved, the software proceeds to the create default crews step  120 . 
         [0011]    In the create default crews step  120 , the user  250  is presented with a screen where he can search for currently established dispatchable units. The units will typically consist of a truck and a crew assigned to the truck, however the units may consist of any distribution of company resources and work crews. If there are not enough dispatchable units, the user  250  is able to create more in this step. In order to create a new dispatchable unit the user  250  uses an option available in the user interface to create an empty dispatchable unit. This empty dispatchable unit may then be filled with any resources desired. When creating the empty dispatchable unit the user  250  can assign a specific product or trade line to it. This product or trade line may be used to determine what resources (such as type of truck, crew, equipment, etc.) would be assigned to that dispatchable unit. After any necessary dispatchable units are created or found they may be opened and the software proceeds to the assign resources step  130 . 
         [0012]    In the assign resources step  130 , the user  250  is capable of assigning any necessary resources to dispatchable units to complete work orders. Additionally, in the assign resources step  130 , the user  250  assigns crew and resources to any new dispatchable units which were opened in the create and find dispatchable units step  120 . Assignments made in the assign resources step  130  are stored in memory and do not reset until they are manually overridden. In order to manually override an assignment, the user  250  re-assigns a given resource to a different dispatchable unit or removes the resource from the dispatchable unit. When work crew members are assigned as a part of the assign resources step, some embodiments of the software allow traits to be assigned to the crew members. These traits could be “licensed driver,” union grades and levels, skill sets, or any other special qualifications a crew member might have. Implementation of this option in an embodiment allows the software to perform a check in the assign resources step to ensure that a given work crew can complete the assigned work order. 
         [0013]    It is additionally anticipated that some embodiments could incorporate a payroll scheme within the assign resources step  130  to aid in payroll management. Under such a scheme, each unit would be assigned a certain overall amount of money associated with the amount of work it could complete. Each member of the work crew assigned to the dispatchable unit would then be assigned a percentage of the amount of money. Finally, the software would compare the total percentages to ensure that no more than 100% of a unit&#39;s amount of money is assigned to a work crew associated to the unit. This optional addition aides the payroll department in determining how much compensation should be paid to each member of a given work crew for particular days work. After all resources have been assigned to the dispatchable unit, the software proceeds to the assign work orders step  140 . 
         [0014]    In the assign work orders step  140 , the user  250  assigns work orders retrieved in the manage data step  110  to dispatchable units. In this step, the user  250  is capable of sorting the work orders based on job type, required skill set, or any other criteria. This functionality allows the user to determine which work orders should be assigned to which dispatchable units based on each dispatchable unit&#39;s available resources. As each work order is assigned, the user  250  has the option of including any completion priorities along with the work order. Examples of these completion priorities could be, but are not limited to, AM, PM, first, second, high, medium, or low. 
         [0015]    Each dispatchable unit has a labor dollar capacity associated with it which is indicative of the amount of labor it can perform in a given day. When a work order is assigned to a dispatchable unit, the software checks the required labor dollar amount of the work order against the remaining available labor dollar capacity of the dispatchable unit. The software then gives a visual cue if the dispatchable unit&#39;s labor dollar capacity for the day has been exceeded. It is additionally anticipated that a color coding system could be implemented to allow a user  250  to determine approximately how much of a dispatchable unit&#39;s labor dollar capacity has been filled by scheduled work orders. Additionally performed in this step is the generation of a pick list. The pick list contains a list of all the materials necessary to complete a work order, as well as an order that the materials should be loaded into a truck. After all necessary work order assignments have been performed, the software proceeds to the dispatch step  160 . 
         [0016]    In the dispatch step  160 , the software transmits the work order assignments to a work order dispatch receiver device associated with each dispatchable unit. The work order dispatch receiver device may be a truck mounted device  260 , or a personal digital assistant (PDA)  270 , or any other device capable of receiving and displaying information associated with the work order. During the dispatch step  160 , the work crew performs the work orders that have been assigned to it. Upon completion of a work order, the work crew may send a work order complete signal back to the central processing unit  210  where the work order is flagged as completed. When the work crew has finished working for the day, a signal is sent back indicating that the crew has stopped working and any incomplete work orders are flagged for completion during the next day. After the central processing unit  210  has received this information, it proceeds to the store information step  170 . 
         [0017]    In the store information step  170 , the central processing unit  210  stores information transmitted from the truck mounted device  260  or the PDA  270  associated with the work order. This information typically includes, but is not limited to, a complete or incomplete status, a progress report on an incomplete work order, or an unable to perform work order status. Once the software has stored this information in a database, any incomplete work orders are assigned to the same work crew for completion on the next day. The software does this by leaving the specific work order associated with the work crew. This allows the user  250  to see that there is a holdover work order still associated with a work crew, when the user  250  initiates the dispatch program the next day. After all associated information has been stored, and any incomplete work orders are flagged for completion the next day, the program proceeds to the end step  180  where it wraps up any processes and shuts down. 
         [0018]      FIG. 2  illustrates a sample user interface that a user  250  would see while interacting with the software. In the dispatchable unit section  310  of the screen, each dispatchable unit is broken down and any work orders assigned to a given dispatchable unit are listed to the right of the dispatchable unit. Immediately to the left of the dispatchable unit section  310  is a work order list  320 . The work order list  320  contains a listing of all the work orders that should be scheduled for a given day, as well as certain information associated with them to aid the dispatcher. Examples of information that could be associated with the work order list  320  are what trade the work order is in, what type of job it entails, and customer name. 
         [0019]      FIG. 3  illustrates a physical configuration designed to implement the system of this application. The physical system contains a central processing unit  210  with a computer readable medium which stores the instructions for executing the process described above. Connected to the central processing unit  210  by either a wireless connection  220  or a physical connection  230  is a dispatch computer  240 . The dispatch computer  240  is capable of accessing the central processing unit and running the process described above. A user  250  operates the dispatch computer and is capable of inputting information or performing any tasks required of the user  250 . A truck mounted device  260  or a PDA  270  is capable of wireless communication with the central processing unit  210  through a wireless connection  220 . Each of the truck mounted devices  260  and the PDAs  270  are capable of displaying any information associated with the work order, and may have the additional capability of printing out a work order ticket. 
         [0020]    Where the term “work crew” has been utilized, it should be understood that this invention would extend to any company resources, including one man “crews.” 
         [0021]    Although an embodiment of this invention has been disclosed, a worker of ordinary skill in this art would recognize that certain modifications would come within the scope of this invention. For that reason, the following claims should be studied to determine the true scope and content of this invention.