GB2414090A

GB2414090A - Method of delivering an item which has a code associated with the delivery address

Info

Publication number: GB2414090A
Application number: GB0410476A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Paul Barton
Original assignee: Royal Mail Group Ltd
Current assignee: Royal Mail Group Ltd
Priority date: 2004-05-11
Filing date: 2004-05-11
Publication date: 2005-11-16
Also published as: GB0410476D0

Abstract

A method of delivering a consignment to a delivery address associated with the consignment comprising the steps of: applying a readable code to the consignment, said code being associated with the delivery address; entering the code into a portable computing device; obtaining a delivery address based on the code entered; obtaining the current location of the portable computing device; comparing the delivery address obtained with the current location and, if the delivery address and location are substantially the same, confirming the delivery of the consignment can proceed.

Description

CONSIGNMENT DELIVERIES

The present invention relates to a method of delivering consignments, in particular it relates to a method of providing confirmation for the delivery of consignments to the correct address.

When a consignment, for example a letter or parcel, is sent to an intended recipient, confirmation that the intended recipient has received the consignment is sometimes required. A known method of obtaining delivery confirmation is for the delivery service provider to obtain a signature from the person who receives the consignment when the consignment is accepted. The signature of the person receiving the consignment is used as proof when checking that the consignment was delivered to the correct address and/or recipient.

However, during the delivery of some types of consignments, such as a nonurgent letter being delivered to a home address, it is not always possible to obtain a signature at the point of delivering the consignment. Also, for non-urgent and/or low value consignments where the cost of delivery is relatively low compared to urgent and/or expensive consignments, the cost of using a signature proof delivery service is prohibitive.

Further, when a consignment is delivered to an address where a signature is not required or has not been obtained, there is no guarantee that the consignment has been delivered to the correct address.

It is known, for example in EP 1211658, to have a system wherein the destination address is translated into a three dimensional global position using a conversion database and subsequently printed onto a tag attached to the consignment. The destination address is regenerated and reprinted on the consignment as the consignment moves from country to country. The date and time of delivery are recorded on the tag when the consignment is delivered and the tag is then returned to the delivery service provider. This technique requires specialised equipment in order to reprint delivery information during the delivery of the consignment, and further, it requires the tag to be returned to the delivery service provider for confirmation of delivery.

It is also known, as shown in US patent application 2002/0123917, to have a shipment code associated with a consignment such that when the consignment is delivered, the code is provided to the delivery person in order to unlock the delivery vehicle to allow delivery. This system requires that the code is sent to the intended recipient prior to delivery of the consignment, and also requires additional specialised equipment forming part of the delivery vehicle.

The present invention aims to overcome, or alleviate, the above mentioned problems.

An aspect of the present invention provides a method of delivering a consignment to a delivery address associated with the consignment comprising the steps of: applying a readable code to the consignment, said code being associated with the delivery address; entering the code into a portable computing device; obtaining a delivery address based on the code entered; obtaining the current location of the portable computing device; comparing the delivery address obtained with the current location and, if the delivery address and location are substantially the same, confirming the delivery of the consignment can proceed.

The present invention provides the advantage of determining whether the delivery person is located at the correct address at the point of delivering a consignment through the use of a clearly visible and readable code applied to the consignment.

Additionally, the present invention provides the advantage of being able to keep a precise record of the location of the delivery person in relation to the intended delivery addresses of the consignments.

Specific embodiments of the present invention will now be described by way of example only, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which: Figure I shows a consignment with a readable code according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Figure 2 shows a flow diagram of actions carried out at a delivery service provider's premises according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Figure 3 shows a system for use in the method according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Figure 4 shows a flow diagram of actions taken during the delivery of a consignment according to an embodiment of the present invention.

Figure 5 shows a flow diagram of actions taken during the delivery of a consignment according to a further embodiment of the present invention.

Figure 6 shows a system for use in a method according to the further embodiment of the present invention.

FIRST EMBODIMENT

A customer with a letter for delivery takes, or sends, the letter to a delivery service provider in order for them to deliver the letter to the intended recipient. In this embodiment the customer provides the delivery service provider with the letter by posting the letter into any conveniently located letterbox.

Figure 1 shows a letter 101 with the name of the intended recipient and delivery address 103 previously written or typed onto the front of the letter by the customer. Applied to the right hand top corner of the letter 101 is a postage stamp 105 bought by the customer. The postage stamp has, as well as the standard postage charge, a premium charge incorporated into it to pay for the delivery confirmation service offered by the delivery service provider.

The postage stamp 105 clearly indicates to the delivery service provider that the delivery confirmation service is required.

When the delivery service provider receives the letter 101, a unique consignment identifier (UCI) 107 is printed on the front of the letter 101 in the form of a bar code 107. Each UCI 107 is unique and is associated with a specific letter 101 received by the delivery service provider. The delivery service provider has a database system that stores the UCls of all consignments received along with the time and date of receipt of the consignments, as explained below.

Additionally, as will be explained below, a clearly visible and readable alphanumeric code 109 is applied to the letter.

Figure 2 indicates the steps taken at the premises of the delivery service provider after receipt of the letter 101 from the customer. At step S201, the UCI 107 is applied to the letter 101 by automatically printing a unique bar code onto the front of the letter 101 using a printing device (not shown), as will be known by a skilled person. After being applied to the letter 101, the UCI 107 is automatically entered into the delivery service provider's database, at which time the date and time of receipt of the letter 101 is also added.

After the application of the UCI 107 to the front of the letter 101, the address 103 of the intended recipient is automatically scanned by an optical scanner and, using known optical character recognition techniques, is entered into the delivery service provider's database alongside the UCI 107, as shown at step S205.

A postal sorting system then sorts through all the different consignments received from various customers such that each consignment is automatically placed into a bin associated with the area to which the consignment is to be delivered, as shown at step S207. A different delivery person is responsible for each specific delivery area.

During the process of sorting the consignments into the various delivery areas, a clearly visible and readable alphanumeric code 109 consisting of four characters is applied the letter 101. The code is printed onto the front of the letter 101 using a printing device (not shown), as will be known by a skilled person. The code 109 is defined such that each consignment within a specific delivery area operated by one delivery person has a unique code 109 applied to it. The code 109 consists of enough characters in order to provide for a degree of redundancy thus allowing error checking of the code 109.

After the code 109 is applied to the letter 101, it is also added to the database alongside the UCI 107 and address 103, as shown at step S211.

Prior to the delivery person leaving the delivery service provider's premises, the database information stored for all the consignments in the specific delivery area associated with the delivery person is downloaded to a laptop in the format of a replica database, as shown at step S213. The delivery person uses the laptop during the delivery of the consignments, as explained below.

Figure 3 shows a block diagram of the system including the delivery service provider's database 301. The database 301 incorporates the database entries 303 for the specific areas associated with each delivery person, with the entries including: the UCI 107, the intended address 103 and the readable alphanumeric code 109. The system further includes the delivery person's laptop 305 that has incorporated into it a speech recognition application 307, a global positioning system 309 and the replica database 311 previously downloaded using a wireless link 313. The laptop 305 also includes a power supply (not shown), a local memory device 317 and a microprocessor 315 that is arranged to control the speech recognition application 307, the global positioning system 309 and the replica database 311.

Figure 4 shows the steps taken after the delivery person has left the delivery service provider's premises with the consignments to be delivered within that delivery person's allocated area.

At step S401, the delivery person arrives at the delivery address printed on the letter 101. At step S403, the delivery person reads out the alphanumeric code 109 into a microphone attached to the delivery person's laptop 305. The code is easily visible to the delivery person as it is printed upon the letter in large clear characters to enable it to be easily read.

The speech recognition application 307 located within the delivery persons laptop 305 uses known speech recognition techniques, such as speaker independent recognition techniques, to interpret the code 109 read out by the delivery person, as shown at step S405. The speaker independent recognition technique allows a number of different users to use the speech recognition application while still obtaining accurate recognition results. This is due to the limited number of valid inputs that the system is arranged to recognise; in this case, the numbers O to 9 and the letters A to Z. At step S407, the microprocessor 315 in the laptop 305 retrieves the intended delivery address of the letter 101 using the code 109 interpreted by the speech recognition application 307. The intended delivery address is retrieved by locating the code 109 read out by the delivery person, and looking up the code's associated intended delivery address within the replica database 311.

At step S409, the global positioning system 309 determines the current location of the delivery person's laptop 305, using known global positioning system techniques. The laptop's current location is stored in the local memory device 317 within the laptop 305.

At step S411 the current location stored within the local memory device 317 is compared with the intended delivery address stored in the replica database 311.

If the current location of the laptop 305 and the intended delivery address match, at step S413 the current time is stored within the replica database 311 as the time of delivery alongside the intended delivery address and code 109 associated with the letter 101 being delivered. Confirmation is provided to the delivery person through an audio and/or visual output from the laptop 305, such as a single beep or confirmatory message display. The delivery person then proceeds to deliver the letter 101 to the address at the current location, as shown at step S415.

On the other hand, if the current location and the intended delivery address do not match at step S411, a warning signal in the form of an audible alert, such as a beeping noise, is emitted from the delivery person's laptop 305, at step S417. The delivery person is thus made aware that there is a possibility that the letter shouldn't be delivered at the current location. The delivery person is given an option to override the delivery system at step S419. If the delivery person chooses to override the system, for example if the incorrect intended address is stored within the replica database 311, an entry is made in the replica database 311 to indicate that the system has been overridden, as shown at step S421.

The delivery person enters the correct delivery details at step S423, such as the corrected street name, house number or postal code. The delivery person re-reads the code 109 as shown at step S403, and the aforementioned procedure is repeated.

If the delivery person does not take the option to override the system at step S419, for example if they determine that they are not located at the correct address, the current location obtained by the global position system 309 and the current time is stored within the replica database 311 alongside the code 109 and intended delivery address associated with the letter 101, as shown at step S425. The delivery person moves to the correct delivery address indicated on the front of the letter 101, at step S427. Upon arriving at the correct location, the delivery person reads out the alphanumeric code lO9 at step S403, upon which the steps as previously discussed are followed.

When the delivery person has finished delivering all the consignments and arrives back at the delivery service provider's premises, all the data in the laptop 305 is uploaded to the database 301. The delivery service provider can access the data in the database 301 using any suitable computer. The data can be used to track delivery performances in different areas and also to analyse any potential problems.

SECOND EMBODIMENT

In this description of the second embodiment the same reference numerals are used to indicate the same components as previously described.

In this embodiment the steps taken at the delivery service provider's premises are the same as in the first embodiment, except that the delivery person does not download the database information for their assigned delivery area, as shown previously at step S213 in Figure 2. Also, the delivery person in this embodiment uses a personal digital assistant (PDA) 605 rather than a laptop. The PDA 605 includes a database system 611 that has no data loaded into it when the delivery person leaves the delivery service provider's premises. The PDA 605 further includes a speech recognition application 607, a global positioning system 609, a local memory device 617 and a microprocessor 615 that is used to control the aforementioned components.

Figure 5 shows the steps taken according to this second embodiment, wherein at step S501 the delivery person arrives at the proposed delivery address printed on the letter 101.

The delivery person reads out the alphanumeric code 109 into a microphone attached to the delivery person's PDA 605, as shown at step S503.

At step S505, the speech recognition application 607 loaded onto the delivery person's PDA 605 determines the alphanumeric code 109 read out by the delivery person using known speech recognition techniques, as explained in the first embodiment.

The following steps are also depicted within Figure 6 in diagrammatic form, wherein the database system 611 is arranged to store the read out alphanumeric code 109 in location 619. Also, location 629 is provided in the database system 611 to store the intended delivery address 103, as explained below. Figure 6 further depicts the delivery service provider's database 301 including the entries 303 associated with the consignment 101. One such entry is the alphanumeric code 109 at location 623. Additionally, the delivery address, as read by the scanner as discussed in the first embodiment, is stored in location 625.

At step S507, the code 109 read out by the delivery service provider is picked up on the microphone attached to the delivery person's PDA 605 and is stored in the database 611 at location 619. The code 109 is forwarded to the delivery service provider's database 301 over a wireless link 621 using known wireless communication techniques. Upon receiving the code 109, the delivery service provider's database 301 compares the code 109 with the entries stored within the database 301. The stored codes having previously been entered into the database 301 during the acceptance and scanning stages upon receipt of the letter 101. When the comparison of codes indicates an entry that matches the read out code, the database 301 forwards the intended delivery address entry 625 via the wireless link 627 back to the delivery service provider's PDA 605. The intended delivery address is entered into the database 611 at location 629, as shown in step S509.

If the code 109 is not recognised by the delivery service provider's database 301, an error signal (not shown) is forwarded to the delivery person's PDA 605 in order to prompt the delivery person to retread the code on the letter through the display of a message and a warning signal.

At step S511, the global positioning system 309 determines the current location of the delivery person's PDA 605 using known global positioning techniques. At step S513, the microprocessor 615 determines whether the current location matches with the intended delivery address stored within the database 611 at location 629. If, the current location matches the intended delivery address then at step S515 the delivery time is stored in the database 611 and the letter 101 is delivered at step S517.

On the other hand, if the current location does not match at step S513, a warning signal in the form of an audible alert, such as a beeping noise, is emitted from the delivery person's PDA 605, at step S519. The delivery person is thus made aware that there is a possibility that the letter shouldn't be delivered at the current location. The delivery person is given an option to override the delivery system at step S521. If the delivery person chooses to override the system, for example if the incorrect intended address is stored within the database 611, an entry is made in the database 611 to indicate that the system has been overridden, as shown at step S523.

The delivery person enters the correct delivery details at step S525, such as the corrected street name, house number or postal code. The delivery person retreads the code 109 as shown at step S403, and the aforementioned procedure is repeated.

If the delivery person does not take the option to override the system at step S521, for example if they determine that they are not located at the correct address, the current location obtained by the global position system 609 and the current time is stored within the database 611 alongside the code 109 and intended delivery address associated with the letter 101, as shown at step S527. The delivery person moves to the correct delivery address indicated on the front of the letter 101, at step S529. Upon arriving at the correct location, the delivery person reads out the alphanumeric code 109 at step S503, upon which the steps as previously discussed are followed.

FURTHER EMBODIMENTS

It will be understood that various modifications and changes may be made to the embodiments described without departing from the scope of the invention.

It will be understood that the unique consignment identifier may be any other suitable arrangement other than a bar code, for example, a string of numbers or letters, a matrix code or a radio frequency identification tag "REID".

Further, it will be understood that the consignment may be any other suitable parcel or package for delivery to an intended recipient.

Further, it will be understood that the addition of the unique consignment identifier to the consignment may be carried out manually either at the delivery service provider's premises or prior to submission to the delivery service provider.

Further, it will be understood that the entry of the consignment address to the database may be carried out manually by entering the address through a keyboard connected to the database or alternatively through the use of speech recognition techniques.

Further, it will also be understood that the sorting of the consignments into the appropriate delivery areas may be carried out manually such that the addresses are read by an employee who then places the consignment into the correct bin for despatch.

Further, it will be understood that the readable alphanumeric code can comprise any number of digits such that the code provides a unique number for each consignment within a set delivery area. Additionally, the alphanumeric code may be added to the consignment by hand either at the delivery service provider's address or elsewhere by providing the code to the person applying the code to the consignment. Further, the alphanumeric code may be added to the database manually through the use of a keyboard connected to the database or speech recognition techniques.

Further, it will be understood that the method by which the replica database is downloaded to the delivery person's portable computing device may be carried out using any suitable wireless technology such as infrared or transmissions using an internet or intranet system, or alternatively using a disc medium to transfer the information.

It will further be understood that if there is a lack of sufficient resolution within the global positioning system it may be necessary for the delivery person to additionally read out the house number or any further information in order to determine whether the current location matches with the intended delivery address.

Further, it will be understood that the delivery person's portable computer may be any device that allows the processes described to be carried out, such as a personal digital assistant (PDA).

Further, it will be understood that error checking of the alphanumeric code may be carried out once the delivery person has read out the code, in order to determine that the code is a valid code.

Further, it will be understood that the application of the alphanumeric code and the UCI onto the consignment may take place after the entry of the code and UCI into the delivery service provider's database.

Further, it will be understood that the type of alert emitted by the delivery person's laptop may be any type of suitable alert, such as a visual or vibrating alert.

Claims

CLAIMS: 1. A method of delivering a consignment to a delivery address

associated with the consignment comprising the steps of: applying a readable code to the consignment, said code being associated with the delivery address; entering the code into a portable computing device; obtaining a delivery address based on the code entered; obtaining the current location of the portable computing device; comparing the delivery address obtained with the current location and, if the delivery address and location are substantially the same, confirming the delivery of the consignment can proceed.
2. The method of claim 1 wherein the code is an alphanumeric 1 5 code.
3. The method of claim 1 wherein the delivery address is obtained from a database located on the portable computing device by looking up the code in the database and retrieving the delivery address associated with the code.
4. The method of claim 1 wherein the delivery address is obtained from a database that is located remotely from the portable computing device by sending the code to a database over a wireless interface, locating the delivery address stored in the database that is associated with the code, and returning the delivery address to the portable computing device via the wireless interface.
5. The method of claim l wherein the current location is obtained by utilising a positioning device associated with the portable computing device.
6. The method of claim 5 wherein additional delivery information is provided to further define the current location.
7. The method of claim 1 wherein the code is entered into the portable computing device verbally.
8. The method of claim 7 wherein the portable computing device determines the code using speech recognition means.
9. The method of claim 1 wherein confirmation is provided by audible or visual means.
lo. The method of claim 1 wherein after entering the code, the time the code was entered is recorded by the portable computing device.
The method of claim 1 further comprising the steps of uploading delivery details from the portable computing device to a central computing device, said central computing device arranged to process said data to enable analysis of delivery activities.
12. The method of claim I wherein the portable computing device is a laptop portable computer.
13. The method of claim I wherein the portable computing device is a personal digital assistant.
14. A portable computing device adapted to be used in the method of any of the preceding claims.
15. A database adapted to be used in the method of any of the preceding claims.
16. A method as substantially hereinbefore described with reference to the accompanying drawings.