Abstract:
An event management method, program product and system for monitoring the status of a purchase order involves receiving purchase order information from a user, obtaining timeline information corresponding to the purchase order, receiving information from one or more sources on the status of the purchase order, using the received information to monitor progress of the purchase order against the timeline information, and providing a notification to the user upon identification of a missed date in the timeline information. Remedial measures are suggested or taken by the event management system.

Description:
RELATED APPLICATIONS  
       [0001]     This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/551,221, filed Mar. 8, 2004 and entitled “Inventory Management,” and U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/563,284, filed Apr. 16, 2004 and entitled “Inventory Management,” both of which are hereby incorporated by reference. 
     
    
     BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION  
       [0002]     A. Field of the Invention  
         [0003]     The present invention is directed to the purchasing and delivery of products and specifically to the monitoring of purchase order status and the performance of follow-up tasks to effect timely delivery.  
         [0004]     B. Background  
         [0005]     In a retail environment, it is important to have effective timing in the purchasing and delivery of products. For example, if a goal is to have goods be on store shelves for sale on a specific date, those goods should be delivered in such a timeframe to effect that goal. If the goods arrive to the store too early, it creates inventory problems and costs. If the goods arrive too late, the sales window is eroded, resulting in lost sales. Therefore, it is important for the buyer or person making purchase orders to have adequate guidance on the timing for placing such purchase orders in order to meet the retailer&#39;s goals.  
         [0006]     It is also important for the buyer to be able to track the progress of the purchase order. If there are delays with the fulfillment of the purchase order, either at the vendor or at some intermediate delivery company, it is important for the buyer to know of such delays promptly. This allows for remedial measures to be taken so that the retailer&#39;s goal of having the goods on sale on a specific date may still be met. Current systems and methods do not adequately facilitate successful remedial measures to be taken. Furthermore, current systems provide insufficient guidance on the timing of purchase orders or on the monitoring of the progress of purchase order fulfillment. They do not facilitate the control of follow up and remedial activities from the purchase ordering system.  
       SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION  
       [0007]     An embodiment of the present invention discloses an event management method, program product and system for monitoring the status of a purchase order. This embodiment involves receiving purchase order information from a user, obtaining timeline information corresponding to the purchase order, receiving information from one or more sources on the status of the purchase order, using the received information to monitor progress of the purchase order against the timeline information, and providing a notification to the user upon identification of a missed date in the timeline information. In an additional embodiment of the invention, the event management method further includes the initiation of follow-up and remedial activities to facilitate timely delivery and fulfillment of the purchase order. In an additional embodiment of the invention, the event management system is fully integrated with the purchase ordering system. Key dates in a purchase order timeline, such as the purchase order date, are transferred freely between the event management system and the purchase order system  
         [0008]     Other features and advantages of the present invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art from the following detailed description. It should be understood, however, that the detailed description and specific examples, while indicating preferred embodiments of the present invention, are given by way of illustration and not limitation. Many changes and modifications within the scope of the present invention may be made without departing from the spirit thereof, and the invention includes all such modifications.  
     
    
     BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS  
       [0009]     The foregoing advantages and features of the invention will become apparent upon reference to the following detailed description and the accompanying drawings, of which:  
         [0010]      FIG. 1  is a block diagram illustrating an exemplary embodiment of an event management system for monitoring the status of a purchase order. 
     
    
     DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EXEMPLARY EMBODIMENTS  
       [0011]      FIG. 1  illustrates the method and system of event management in accordance with a preferred embodiment of the present invention. As shown in this figure, the event management system  20  is independent from the retail system  10 . This however reflects one specific embodiment and the scope of the present invention is not limited by such separation.  
         [0012]     A user of the retail system  10  is able to create and place purchase orders using preferably an order entry workbench. This workbench allows a user to create and submit purchase orders for goods. As shown in element  100 , the user selects products from an active view on a display screen of the order entry workbench. Element  105  refers to a procurement screen displayed on said workbench for processing of purchase orders. Element  110  refers to the actual processing of purchase orders as performed by the retail system. Element  115  refers to the end of monitoring of a purchase order. This end can be reached when the purchase order has been fulfilled or cancelled.  
         [0013]     For a given product, the user is given a timeline that contains information regarding that product pertaining to its delivery and timing. This timeline can be pre-existing using historical data and contains information such as the events that must take place between the placement of the purchase order and the goods being placed on the shelves in the retail store. For example, the user can input the target date for having the goods on the shelves. The retail system, using the timeline for the product will calculate the latest date on which a purchase order can be placed for such goods. The timeline contains information on other events in the purchase order fulfillment process such as: the production end date, the departure date of the goods from the vendor, the arrival date of the goods at a destination port, the goods received date at the distribution center of the retailer, the departure date of the goods from the distribution center, the received date of the goods at the retailer store, and finally, the presentation date of the goods at the store.  
         [0014]     If, for a given product being ordered, there is no pre-existing timeline using historical data, a new timeline is generated using default values. The user is also able to edit the timeline associated with the product being ordered and the events contained therein. The timelines are stored in a database or are transmitted as part of the purchase order.  
         [0015]     Once the purchase order is placed, the event monitoring system  20  retrieves the timeline either from a database or from the purchase order and uses it and the purchase order information to monitor, in element  140 , compliance with the event dates set forth in the timeline. This monitoring is important in determining whether key dates are being met or are being missed indicating a delay.  
         [0016]     The information needed for such monitoring can come directly from the third party vendor or delivery company through human queries or through computer based methods. In the preferred embodiment of the invention, the event management system  20  interfaces with the appropriate computer systems of the various third parties including the vendor, the delivery companies, and/or internal computer systems of the retailer, in order to obtain real-time or near real-time status information on the status of the purchase order and the location of the products. This is facilitated by the event monitoring system&#39;s use of standard interfaces.  
         [0017]     For each specific vendor, or for a plurality of vendors, a customer is able to define an activity profile. This activity profile contains rules regarding the procedures to be used with that vendor or vendors. For example, a buyer dealing with a large or important vendor to the retailer should not be able to cancel a purchase order without first giving the vendor a specific amount of time to remedy a delay. This could be one of the rules embodied in the activity profile for that vendor. Also, depending on the country of the vendor, local laws may require that certain procedures be followed, procedures that are not required in countries of other vendors. Such differences can be addressed through the activity profiles.  
         [0018]     The event management system  20 , has access to such activity profiles corresponding to vendors of specific products and purchase orders. In element  145 , the event management system determines, based on the activity profile for the relevant vendor and/or other rules as determined by the user, what action to take if it is determined that a date in the timeline corresponding to the purchase order has been missed. If such a problem arises, an attempt is made to place an indicator of the problem in the user&#39;s work list in the order entry workbench. As shown in element  125 , if the problem is new in that it has not been added before, it is added to the user&#39;s work list as shown in element  120 .  
         [0019]     The event management system offers a suggestion to the user of a remedial measure for addressing the problem identified. For example, it may suggest to cancel the purchase order. The user can then manually decide whether or not to cancel the purchase order. Only those remedial measures that are allowed for the situation and the specific vendor based on the activity profile are offered to the user. For example, even if a shipment is delayed, the user may be prevented from canceling a purchase order from an important vendor. In such an example, the user may decide to give the vendor an extra week for delivery of the goods. The user would update the purchase order in element  105  and the system would proceed by monitoring compliance with the new date.  
         [0020]     Certain actions or remedial measures can be performed automatically without manual input by a user. Based on the activity profile for a vendor, the event management system may, for example, in element  130  send an initial reminder to the vendor upon determining that a date has been missed.  
         [0021]     The event management system also handles errors as shown in element  150 . For example, if a user cancels a purchase order for which the retailer has already paid the vendor, the cancellation will not be processed and the problem will be indicated on the user&#39;s work list  120 .  
         [0022]     The information and analysis provided by the event management system can be used not only to remedy delays but also to trigger advance notification for advertising and capacity management. For example, in the purchase order process, when the products reach a specific point, it may trigger deployment of an advertising campaign for said products.  
         [0023]     The event management system of an embodiment of the invention is fully integrated with the purchase ordering system. Key dates in a purchase order timeline, such as the purchase order date, are transferred freely between the event management system and the purchase order system.  
         [0024]     As noted above, embodiments within the scope of the present invention include program products comprising computer-readable media for carrying or having computer-executable instructions or data structures stored thereon. Such computer-readable media can be any available media that can be accessed by a general purpose or special purpose computer. By way of example, such computer-readable media can comprise RAM, ROM, EPROM, EEPROM, CD-ROM or other optical disk storage, magnetic disk storage or other magnetic storage devices, or any other medium which can be used to carry or store desired program code in the form of computer-executable instructions or data structures and which can be accessed by a general purpose or special purpose computer. When information is transferred or provided over a network or another communications connection (either hardwired, wireless, or a combination of hardwired or wireless) to a computer, the computer properly views the connection as a computer-readable medium. Thus, any such connection is properly termed a computer-readable medium. Combinations of the above are also to be included within the scope of computer-readable media. Computer-executable instructions comprise, for example, instructions and data which cause a general purpose computer, special purpose computer, or special purpose processing device to perform a certain function or group of functions.  
         [0025]     The invention is described in the general context of method steps, which may be implemented in one embodiment by a program product including computer-executable instructions, such as program code, executed by computers in networked environments. Generally, program modules include routines, programs, objects, components, data structures, etc. that perform particular tasks or implement particular abstract data types. Computer-executable instructions, associated data structures, and program modules represent examples of program code for executing steps of the methods disclosed herein. The particular sequence of such executable instructions or associated data structures represents examples of corresponding acts for implementing the functions described in such steps.  
         [0026]     The present invention in some embodiments, may be operated in a networked environment using logical connections to one or more remote computers having processors. Logical connections may include a local area network (LAN) and a wide area network (WAN) that are presented here by way of example and not limitation. Such networking environments are commonplace in office-wide or enterprise-wide computer networks, intranets and the Internet. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that such network computing environments will typically encompass many types of computer system configurations, including personal computers, hand-held devices, multi-processor systems, microprocessor-based or programmable consumer electronics, network PCs, minicomputers, mainframe computers, and the like. The invention may also be practiced in distributed computing environments where tasks are performed by local and remote processing devices that are linked (either by hardwired links, wireless links, or by a combination of hardwired or wireless links) through a communications network. In a distributed computing environment, program modules may be located in both local and remote memory storage devices.  
         [0027]     An exemplary system for implementing the overall system or portions of the present invention might include a general purpose computing device in the form of a conventional computer, including a processing unit, a system memory, and a system bus that couples various system components including the system memory to the processing unit. The system memory may include read only memory (ROM) and random access memory (RAM). The computer may also include a magnetic hard disk drive for reading from and writing to a magnetic hard disk, a magnetic disk drive for reading from or writing to a removable magnetic disk, and an optical disk drive for reading from or writing to removable optical disk such as a CD-ROM or other optical media. The drives and their associated computer-readable media provide nonvolatile storage of computer-executable instructions, data structures, program modules and other data for the computer.  
         [0028]     Software and web implementations of the present invention could be accomplished with standard programming techniques with rule based logic and other logic to accomplish the various database searching steps, correlation steps, comparison steps and decision steps. It should also be noted that the word “component” as used herein and in the claims is intended to encompass implementations using one or more lines of software code, and/or hardware implementations, and/or equipment for receiving manual inputs.  
         [0029]     The foregoing description of embodiments of the present invention has been presented for purposes of illustration and description. It is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the present invention to the precise form disclosed, and modifications and variations are possible in light of the above teachings or may be acquired from practice of the present invention. The embodiments were chosen and described in order to explain the principals of the present invention and its practical application to enable one skilled in the art to utilize the present invention in various embodiments and with various modifications as are suited to the particular use contemplated.