Patent ID: 8600817

Claim:
A system comprising: event rules identifying pieces of point-of-sale data that are of interest, wherein the point-of-sale data is generated from a plurality of point-of-sale applications running on a plurality of different point-of-sale registers; at least one event generator configured to compare the point-of-sale data to the event rules and to generate an event when a piece of the point-of-sale data satisfies one of the event rules, wherein source information is associated with the generated event including: a store identifier identifying a store from which the point-of-sale data that generated the event originated, a point-of-sale register identifier identifying a point-of-sale register from which the point-of-sale data that generated the event originated, a transaction identifier identifying a transaction from which the point-of-sale data that generated the event originated, and an item identifier identifying an item from the transaction from which the point-of-sale data that generated the event originated; a processor that compares the source information of the generated event against source information in open events to determine whether the generated event is a duplicate event, wherein open events include previously generated events that have not yet been closed; wherein the generated event is a duplicate event when at least two pieces of source information of the generated event match at least two pieces of source information in an open event; an electronic task handler configured to: activate a task for a position in a business section of a store in response to the generated event, the task being indicative of an activity to be performed to address the event, being marked as open, being attached to the generated event and being saved together with the generated event in a database of open events; assign the task to a user acting in the position of the business section of the store associated with the source information such that the user is assigned to perform the task; and send an alert to at least one handheld client device that the user in the position of the business section of the store is logged in to, the alert indicating that the user has been assigned the task.