Patent ID: 8799111

Claim:
An order processing system, comprising: a computer-based kiosk provided to a point-of-sale (POS) location, the kiosk being configured to (a) enable consumers to order, but not purchase, products that are not stocked by the POS location, (b) generate order numbers for ordered products, the order numbers being formatted in accordance with a first mask, and (c) generate, for a consumer who has ordered at least one product, an article including an order number and a product identifier pair for each said product being ordered; a computerized POS checkout system provided to the POS location; and an electronic registration (ER) system including at least one processor and an ER database, the ER system being configured to receive from the POS checkout system a data feed including unique identifiers of purchased products and create corresponding entries in the ER database, at least a portion of the unique identifiers being formatted in accordance with a second mask, the second mask being different from the first mask, wherein a supplier-side computer system is configured to receive first messages confirming that payment has been received for ordered products and, in response thereto, to initiate shipment of ordered and confirmed products and send second messages to the ER system when ordered and confirmed products are shipped, the second messages including associated order numbers and actual identifiers for the products being shipped, and wherein the ER system is configured to receive the second messages and associate, in the ER database, the actual identifiers from the second messages with the order numbers from the first messages; wherein the POS checkout system is configured to: process the generated article in order to complete a sale of each product ordered through the kiosk and associated with the generated article, and treat the order number and the product identifier pair of each said product associated with the generated article as if they together were a unique identifier of the corresponding ordered product and include this information in the data feed, and wherein the ER system is further configured to: analyze the data feed in order to separate out order number and product identifier pairs, from unique identifiers, and send a first message indicating that payment has been received to a supplier of each product being ordered in a case that a corresponding order number and identifier pair is detected in the data feed.