Patent ID: 7792762

Claim:
A method for delivering a price quote from a railway transportation company to a customer for sending a shipment by rail, the method implemented by a system comprising a computing device associated with the customer, the method including: a) displaying on a display unit at the computing device one or more information gathering fields to allow the customer to specify an origin and destination of the shipment; b) receiving at the computing device data originating from the customer and conveying the specified origin and the specified destination of the shipment; c) in response to receipt of the data conveying the specified origin and the specified destination of the shipment, displaying on the display unit at the computing device a route selection field presenting the customer with: i) a plurality of different rail transportation routes passing through different geographical locations, between the specified origin and the specified destination of the shipment, each rail transportation route in the plurality of different rail transportation routes having either: (1) a single owner; or (2) several owners in which case each of the several owners owns at least one different segment of the rail transportation route; ii) for at least some transportation routes in the plurality of different rail transportation routes, information identifying one or more owners of the rail transportation route; iii) an option to select a rail transportation route for the shipment from among the plurality of different rail transportation routes presented to the customer thereby enabling the customer to select a particular rail transportation route for the shipment at least in part based on one or more owners of the particular rail transportation route; d) receiving at the computing device data conveying the particular rail transportation route selected by the customer from among the plurality of different rail transportation routes presented to the customer; e) using the computing device, causing a price quote for the shipment to be computed on the basis of multiple factors including the particular rail transportation route selected by the customer; f) displaying on the display unit at the computing device a price quotation field for conveying to the customer a price quote for the shipment computed on the basis of multiple factors including the particular rail transportation route selected by the customer.