Patent ID: 7627500

Claim:
A method for checking product availability for a listing on a network-based auction service, comprising: determining, using an auction application separate from the network-based auction service, an available quantity of products based on information received from a business information management system; each time a user logs into the auction application and specifies a listing criteria of the products, following steps are executed by the auction application, (i) automatically executing a login script of the user that includes a query to the business information management system, the query including user-specified listing criteria of the products, (ii) transmitting the query to the information management system to retrieve product information based on the user-specified listing criteria, and (iii) responsive to receiving the query from the information management system, transmitting to the user an alert including a list of products that meet the user-specified listing criteria; designating, by the user in the auction application, a selected quantity of the products for a listing on the network-based auction service; listing, by the auction application, product information about the selected quantity of products on the network-based auction service; during the listing, reserving, by the auction application, the selected quantity in the business information management system from being otherwise disposed; monitoring, by the auction application, the product information via a user-selected listing of the selected quantity of the products for the auction sale in a first user interface of the auction application; and generating, by the auction application, a report based on user-specified parameters, wherein the report is displayed in a second user interface of the auction application.