WO2017213584A1

WO2017213584A1 - Method and system for collectively arranging deliveries

Info

Publication number: WO2017213584A1
Application number: PCT/SG2016/050263
Authority: WO
Inventors: Song Liu
Original assignee: Song Liu
Priority date: 2016-06-07
Filing date: 2016-06-07
Publication date: 2017-12-14

Abstract

There is disclosed a method and system for collectively arranging free or discounted deliveries amongst multiple customers, comprising: providing a user interface and process for a customer to specify shipping destination, to view delivery time slots information and to select a delivery time slot; in dependence upon a shipping address added by a customer, clustering shipping destinations eligible for collective delivery together; in dependence upon a shipping destination specified for an order, providing a customer with derived collective delivery time slots information; in dependence upon a delivery arrangement confirmed by a customer, updating collective delivery time slots information. There is provided also a method for a business to advertise on collective delivery time slots by displaying advertisements or sponsoring free or discounted deliveries in the customer user interface for customers whose shipping destinations falls in the target area, for target time slots selected by an advertiser, business owner or retailer.

Description

METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR COLLECTIVELY ARRANGING DELIVERIES

FIELD OF THE INVENTION

The present invention relates generally to a method and system for collectively arranging free or discounted deliveries amongst multiple participants.

BACKGROUND

The rapid adoption of computing devices has made it increasingly convenient for a consumer to purchase products and services online. While some of those products and services are provided in the form of software or digital content, many of them involve the delivery of physical packages, merchandises, parcels, and other general items. For example, merchandises will need to be shipped to a customer in a residential area once the customer completes online grocery shopping. Online food ordering involves the distribution of food and/or beverage from a supplier to a customer instructed address. Similarly, online laundry service providers may need to fetch clothes from their customers and deliver clean items back, either through themselves or a third party delivery service provider.

For many business-to-consumer e-commerce businesses that require transportation of physical objects, delivery service can be a substantial cost as their customers may be scattered across the country or region where the business operates in. Delivery service providers often rely on the economy of scale, where they invest heavily in the infrastructure (such as vehicles), sales, marketing, and advertisements to obtain a large consumer base, in order to reduce the average cost of shipping, while taking a risk by assuming that the user base will scale after the investment. Online retailers or service providers often have to either bear with the risk of handling delivery logistics by themselves or outsource to a third-party logistics company with a fee. In order to get a customer to complete a transaction, businesses often absorb the cost of delivery while imposing a minimum spending restriction or pricing in the delivery cost into their products. Businesses may also be willing to absorb the cost when their products have higher profit margins or their products are in general very expensive - thus, equivalent to the notion of exceeding minimum spending. However, setting a high minimum spending or higher price can discourage customers from completing a transaction.

From a customer's perspective, they may often end up having to buy more than what they need in order to reach minimum spending, or they may bear with the delivery fee or the higher price. Customers may not even be aware of the additional delivery cost priced into their purchases. In some cases, the cost of delivery can be a deal breaker for both businesses and consumers, especially when the transaction value is not large. For instance, a 5$ delivery service fee charged to a customer for a 10$ meal means 50 percent additional cost to the customer. If the food providers or restaurants were to absorb the delivery charge, they may end up suffering a loss.

SUMMARY

The present invention relates to organizing collective delivery services amongst consumers who have similar needs. More specifically, the present invention involves the methods, systems, user interfaces and processes to make it easy and cost-effective for a customer to get purchased items shipped to a desired address at the same time slot together with other customers who wish to arrange delivery to be made at the same or nearby addresses.

Some of the embodiments provide methods and techniques to allow consumers to be recognizant of available delivery arrangements for the desired shipping destination across multiple time slots so that they may instruct delivery to be made at a free or discounted time slot for that address. Such time slots are dynamically unlocked as free or discounted slots while other consumers arrange deliveries to be made to the same or nearby shipping destinations. A time slot may also be unlocked as free or discounted when advertisers, retailers or businesses advertise on or sponsor that slot. In this regard, consumers may only be required to spend much less to enjoy free or discounted delivery, without having to purchase more than what they need. Some example embodiments involve methods to unlock free or discounted delivery slots for a cluster of shipping addresses once consumers collectively, for example, reach a minimum transaction value. Some example embodiments provide methods for a business to unlock, sponsor and/or advertise on free or discounted delivery time slots.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIGURE 1 is a brief map with example commercial and residential buildings and units that can be selected as shipping destination, in accordance with certain example embodiments.

FIGURE 2 is a wireframe of example commercial and residential buildings and units that can be selected as shipping destination, in accordance with certain example embodiments.

FIGURE 3 is a block diagram depicting a communication architecture for arranging collective ordering and delivery, and for advertising on delivery time slots, in accordance with certain example embodiments.

FIGURE 4 is a diagram depicting example context of delivery arrangements for four users residing nearby each other in the same example condominium, in accordance with certain example embodiments.

FIGURE 5 is a diagram depicting two example user interface with different example delivery arrangement information based on different transaction value, in accordance with certain example embodiments. FIGURE 6 is a diagram depicting a method to arrange for collective delivery based on customer transaction and shipment instruction, in accordance with certain example embodiments.

FIGURE 7 is a diagram, in accordance with certain example embodiments, depicting a method for a business to advertise on collective delivery time slots or to sponsor for free or discounted deliveries.

FIGURE 8 is a diagram, in accordance with certain example embodiments, illustrating an example shipping address clustering mechanism based on the same postal code.

FIGURE 9 is a diagram, in accordance with certain example embodiments, depicting yet another shipping address cluster setup for the same registered shipping points from FIGURE 8, based on the distances between shipping addresses.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EXAMPLE EMB ODFMENT S

Overview:

The example embodiments described herein provide methods and techniques to arrange collectively for free or discounted delivery, or to refund for a charged delivery for customers. They also provide methods and techniques for businesses to promote products and brands by advertising on and sponsoring free or discounted delivery time slots for selected shipping areas at selected time slots. While the disclosed embodiments use condominiums, office buildings or neighborhoods as a context to illustrate how customers in the same area can collectively arrange for delivery through an example user interface provided by code running in computing devices, the methods and techniques can be applied to wider areas as well. Such as collectively ordering and arranging for shipments for all customers residing in the same town or district. Meanwhile, the methods, systems, and techniques may also be used for items pick up, such as fetching clothes for a neighborhood in the context of online laundry services, and food collection from restaurants for online food ordering. Furthermore, delivery, or words with similar meaning, is used across the text implicitly to refer to any kind of delivery, or shipment, of products, packages, parcels or any other items that require transportation, including but not limited to grocery, food and clothes. Furthermore, customers who collectively arrange for delivery may or may not be explicitly informed the identities of other consumers who instruct shipment to be made to the same or a close by address at the same time slot, as well as the purchase information associated with a time slot. In either case, the privacy and confidential information for a business or a customer shall not be compromised without otherwise specifically agreed by a business or a customer to share such information. While some example embodiments involve order booking by a customer, the disclosed invention may be used for delivery management alone, by receiving or making orders through other applications and services.

With reference to FIGURE 1, consider an example neighborhood where consumers may use the present invention for collective shipment arrangement, or order combination. Triangle shapes 110 to 118 represents example privately owned houses. Each of them may be registered as a shipping destination for services such as online grocery shopping. Star shapes 120 to 122 represents three example condominiums. Each of those condominiums may have at least one block, or building, while each of those blocks may contain at least one unit. Rectangle shapes 130 to 134 represents five example blocks of HDBs. Similar to condominiums, each of those blocks may contain at least one unit, which may be registered as shipping destination by some consumers. Finally, oval shape 140 represents an example office building which may be specified as shipping destination by a group of office workers who may, for example, collectively order for food delivery through the present embodiments, with or without knowing the other people who are ordering at the same time. Referring to FIGURE 2, 210 is a zoomed view of unit 110 where 211 is a wireframe depicting a standalone unit. Similarly, 222 is an example wireframe for the condominium 122, consisting of three example blocks (such as 223), each of them may have potentially many units, such as 224. 230 is a wireframe for an example HDB 130, while 235 is a building and 236 is a unit. Finally, 240 is the wireframe for 140 where 241 depicts the example office building which may have many addresses, such as unit 242. Consumers who, for example, reside or work in such an example neighborhood may from time to time arrange for delivery to their addresses.

A collective delivery software as a service platform may be used by consumers in the example neighborhood. In an example embodiment, after an order is made, a consumer specifies shipping destination. Once a shipping address is specified, a request is sent to platform servers through a communication network, to fetch available delivery time slots information. A time slot may contain information such as delivery charge, description, the time duration for the slot and associated advertisements. Through methods and techniques in the present disclosure, two consumers that specified two different shipping addresses may be presented with different time slot information, such as different delivery charge, depending on information such as associated transaction value for all shipping addresses nearby, cost to travel between addresses and availability of sponsored free or discounted delivery from businesses. Once a customer confirms delivery arrangement, the transaction information together with shipment instruction may be sent to platform servers which will, in accordance with some example embodiments, update transaction value and time slot information for shipping address cluster associated with customer instructed address. In some example embodiments, shipping addresses are clustered by the same postal code. The clusters information is used by the platform servers to calculate delivery time slot information upon consumer request. As transactions and delivery instructions are received, a free or discounted delivery time slot may be unlocked when the total transaction value for that slot exceeds a minimum transaction value threshold. Consumers may be refunded for a delivery fee associated with a time slot that is unlocked as free or discounted later on.

By employing the methods and techniques described herein, the collective delivery platform or order combination platform dynamically offers consumers free or discounted delivery options, based upon delivery arrangements made by other consumers. As such, the minimum spending amount may be substantially reduced in order for consumers to enjoy free or discounted delivery. For example, consumers may order fresh vegetables and fruits every day for 10$ per purchase together with other residents living in the same condominium who have similar needs. They may not have to worry about the 50$ worth items they purchased in one go will turn bad over the week with traditional delivery methods which require a minimum spending of 30$ for a customer alone. Meanwhile, by allowing customers to be recognizant of delivery arrangements made by people close by, they may save cost by arranging delivery to be made at the same delivery slot. Furthermore, transportation resource and cost can be saved for the benefits of both business owners and consumers when consumers combine orders or shipments together with other consumers. Moreover, the methods and techniques disclosed may introduce new ways of conducting businesses when delivery cost is no longer a concern. For example, a bread brand that has a few branches in urban shopping malls may promote its brand within selected areas by offering free delivery options at selected time slots. Consumers from those areas can either choose the promoted time slots, or collectively order products from the brand so that they can enjoy frequently over breakfasts, without having to frequently go out to downtown and purchase in large quantity at once. Hence, the methods and techniques described herein reduce business and consumer cost, provide convenience for consumers as they can more frequently order and arrange for delivery online and can potentially bring in additional cash flows and new ways to operate for businesses.

Example System Architectures:

Referring to FIGURE 3, an order combination client application 311 can be installed on a consumer computing device 310. The client application can have an address management module 312, which allows consumers to register, update and delete shipping addresses. For example, a user may enter a postal code to get country, state and street information, and populate additional details such as floor and unit number. Alternatively, a user may select from suggested addresses based on information that is typed in by the user. In the present embodiment, the client application contains an order booking module 313 which allows consumers to purchase products to be shipped through collective ordering and delivery methods. 421, 422, 423 and 424 from FIGURE 4 provides example user interface with purchase information of 4 consumers. As depicted in the example user interface, User-411-1 from 421 has made a purchase with a transaction value of 10$, while User- 412-1, User-413-1, and User-414-1 has transaction value of 38$, 13$ and 12$ respectively. Returning back to FIGURE 3, the order booking module is not a compulsory module, as orders may be booked from other applications installed in the consumer computing device, and sent to the order combination client application to arrange for delivery. A delivery arrangement module 314 enables consumers to view available delivery options, arrange for collective delivery and to track shipment progress. Last but the least, a payment module 315 handles the payment for purchase. In situations where consumers decide to arrange for delivery on a charged time slot, the payment module will handle such charges. When a charged time slot is unlocked later as free slot, the payment module may refund charged fees to consumers. Alternatively, the payment module may treat such delivery fee as an amount payable and charge a customer only when the fee is confirmed.

An order combination business application 321 may be installed in a business computing device 320. The present innovation allows business owners, retailers or advertisers to promote a brand and advertise on the delivery time slots that customers may choose from, by using advertisement management module 322, delivery policy management module 325 and payment module 326. The advertisement management module allows a business user to select areas to promote, for example by choosing a list of postal code, which may be shown on a map for easy visualization. Meanwhile, a business user may select only desired promotion slots for those shipping destinations. The product catalog management 323 and customer order management module 324 enables business users to manage products display and orders performed by customers in the order combination client application 311. Business users may alternatively employ other applications for product and order management while at the same time using the present disclosed methods and systems for advertisement and delivery management. The payment module 326 is for handling fees involved in using services provided by order combination platform.

Continue to refer to FIGURE 3. A variety of data 331 may be stored in a collective ordering and delivery platform server, such as shipping address data 332, map and road data 333 for calculating distance and cost to travel from one address to another, delivery policy data 334 from business for customizing available delivery time slots, product data 335 for customer order booking, order data 336 from customer orders and shipping instructions 337 from customer confirmed deliveries. Alternatively, third party map services may be used to calculate distance and cost to travel between addresses. Backend services 339 are installed in the server for processing consumer and businesses requests from client and business applications running on computing devices. 339 may also include services to derive information based on a variety of data in 331, update shipping clusters information for collective delivery arrangements and process payment.

Finally, variety options of shipping vehicle 340 may be used to transport requested items to the desired shipping destination. Such vehicle may or may not be driverless. It may or may not be a taxi, a motorcycle, a drone or an ordinary truck that is capable of transporting an object from one location to another location.

Example Methods:

With reference to FIGURE 4 and FIGURE 5, consider an example grocery shopping use case of the order combination client application for residents in an example condominium 410 that has three blocks with the same postal code 600001. Consider also a simple policy which unlocks free delivery for consumers who intend to ship to addresses associated with the same postal code, when the total transaction value reaches 30$ for the same time slot. 421 to 424 represents example orders with different transaction values, while unit 411 to 414 are the shipping destinations for the orders respectively. User-412-1 alone has made a purchase of 38$, which is above the threshold of 30$. 520 from FIGURE 5 is an example view for the user to arrange for delivery. As presented in example 521, the user can enjoy free delivery for all available time slots. The other 3 users with a transaction value of 10$, 13$ and 12$ may have to pay for an additional delivery fee if they were to order for delivery separately in traditional delivery arrangements. With order combination application, they may now be able to enjoy free delivery when they order a delivery to be made at a free time slot unlocked by others. Alternatively, they may get delivery fee refunded if a paid delivery time slot is unlocked later by other consumers or businesses alike. With reference to FIGURE 5, 510 is an example delivery arrangement view for User-411-1 who made a purchase of 10$, consider the situation where User-412-1 has instructed the delivery to be made at 4:00-5:00 before User-411-1 proceeds to delivery arrangement, while the retailer^ and the advertiser B has advertised on time slot 3 :00-4:00 and time slot 7:00-8:00 as they want to expand their business operations for that condominium. Meanwhile, User-413-1 and User-414-1 who has a transaction value of 25$ in total arranged delivery to be made at 6:00-7:00, with additional charges shared by both users. For User-411-1, as depicted in 510, the time slot 511 and 515 are free due to advertisements from businesses. 512 is free as the total transaction value for that slot is 38$, which is above the minimum threshold. 514 is also free, as the total transaction value, including the purchase of 10$ to be confirmed, reaches 35$ which is above the minimum threshold. If the user selects 514, both User-413-1 and User-414-1 may be refunded with the delivery charge to enjoy free delivery together with User-411-1. Alternatively, instead of charging a customer delivery fee early and refunding later, the payment module in the order combination client application may only treat the charge as amount payable and only take effects at a later time. Finally, 513 is not a free delivery slot yet. However, the User-411-1 may still select 513 and get refunded if the delivery slot is later unlocked as a free slot.

Now turn to FIGURE 6, FIGURE 7 and FIGURE 8 for some example methods to arrange for collective delivery and to advertise on collective delivery time slots as described above. Referring to FIGURE 8 first. FIGURE 8 is an example naive clustering mechanism based on postal code. 810 is a cluster where shipping destination A, Bl, B2, C, and D are all associated with the same postal code 100001, while 820 and 830 are clusters associated with postal code 200001 and 300001 respectively. With this setup, all customers who specify shipping destination to any of the shipping points A, Bl, B2, C or D will be able to collectively order delivery. Now turn to FIGURE 6 for the methods and techniques to arrange for such collective delivery. With reference to 610, a customer registers a new shipping address using the address management module 312 mentioned in FIGURE 3. The request is sent to platform server, which links the address to associated postal code (650). In other words, the newly registered address is added to a cluster corresponding to the postal code for that address. A customer may specify a delivery destination from a list of addresses that are previously registered by the customer. A customer may make an order (612) and start arranging delivery (614) once an address to ship is specified. Upon receiving customer request to view all available delivery arrangements for the desired shipping destination, in accordance with 652, the platform server retrieves the shipping address cluster information associated with the postal code of the specified shipping destination. For that cluster, for each time slot, the platform server retrieves the total transaction value for all the shipping destinations within the cluster. The platform server then derives time slot information such as charges and associated ads and purchases and respond all available time slots to a customer for selection. Once a customer confirms a time slot to ship (616), the server will update the total transaction value of the cluster associated with the postal code of customer instructed shipping address (654). When a customer requests to view all delivery time slots (614) again, the updated total transaction value will be used to determine whether a charge should be applied for that same time slot (652).

Now turn to FIGURE 7 for methods to associate an advertisement to a collective delivery time slot. With reference to 790, a business user can specify an area to advertise, for only selected time slots that are available to advertise on. The area to advertise may be determined by postal codes selected by a business user. As a customer requests to view all time slots information, the server will retrieve the associated advertisement information that a business user has specified (752). In the example interface 510 in FIGURE 5, a retailer ^ may select time slot 3 :00-4:00 for address 600001 to advertise on, for example, to increase brand awareness across residents living at the condominium with postal code 600001. Meanwhile, an advertiser B may select a different time slot 7:00-8:00 to advertise on. With reference to FIGURE 8 830, consider a more general case where an advertiser sponsors free delivery for selected postal code 300001 at selected time slot X. As shipping points M, N, O, P, Q and R are associated with postal code 300001, customers who specify shipping destination to be any of those shipping points will be presented with a free or discounted delivery option corresponding to that time slot, while in the meantime they shall be presented with one or many advertisements in a variety of potential media formats such as text, picture and video.

Other Example Embodiments:

As another example, FIGURE 9 illustrates yet another set of shipping point clusters resulting from a different clustering approach. In some embodiments, algorithms such as K- MEANS clustering algorithm may be employed to cluster the shipping addresses. Compared to the example clustering mechanism illustrated in FIGURE 8 which use the same postal code as clustering criteria, these clusters can potentially contain shipping points that are associated with different postal codes. Some clusters may only contain one shipping address as the shipping address is not close enough to any shipping address nearby. As such, the notion of collective delivery may be compromised for clusters with only one shipping destination. As depicted in FIGURE 9, the same set of shipping points from FIGURE 8 is used for illustration. For simplicity, consider FIGURE 9 to be a snapshot of all registered shipping addresses for a time slot, while 921 and 922 are two shipping destinations that customers have already confirmed. In this case, customers who intend to ship to any of the shipping point D, E, N, R or O in cluster 910 can collectively arrange for free or discounted delivery through the methods described in the previous section. In some example embodiments, total transaction value for a cluster is used to determine whether free or discounted delivery is eligible. As such, a customer who specifies shipping destination to be point Q at 931 will be able to utilize the transaction value from orders associated with 921 and 922. Customer who intends to order delivery to 941 will not be able to utilize the transaction value from 921 and 922 resulting from the current cluster setup, as the addresses belong to different clusters despite that the postal code remains the same.

The example methods, procedures, systems, and techniques described in the previous embodiments are illustrative. While some embodiments have been described in detail, the description is merely for the purpose of illustration and it should be appreciated that various changes may be made. For example, some embodiments use the same postal code as the clustering criteria for grouping collective delivery shipping destinations, while a wide range of clustering algorithms and techniques may be used to fulfill similar purpose. In another example, some embodiments use total transaction value of a cluster of shipping address for a time slot to determine whether the time slot is eligible for free or discounted delivery for that cluster, while a variety of different methods, such as by counting total number of orders, may be used to determine eligibility of free or discounted delivery. Furthermore, some example embodiments use client-server architecture to implement the collective delivery system described herein, while such system may also be implemented in a distributed peer to peer architecture, without departing from the spirt and scope of the embodiments. In yet another example, a business user uses an application installed in a business device to advertise on selected area for selected collective delivery time slot. Such advertisement agreements to advertise on collective delivery time slots may also be achieved without a business computing device. It should also be appreciated that some aspects described in the disclosed embodiments are not intended as required or essential unless otherwise stated explicitly. Thus, in accordance with some embodiments, there is provided a method and system for collectively arranging deliveries, comprising: providing a user interface and process for customers to specify shipping destination, view delivery time slots information and select a delivery time slot; in dependence upon a shipping address added by a customer, clustering shipping destinations eligible for collective delivery together; in dependence upon a shipping destination specified for an order, providing a customer with derived collective delivery time slots information; in dependence upon a delivery arrangement confirmed by a customer, updating collective delivery time slots information. There is provided also a method for a business to advertise on collective delivery time slots, comprising: providing a method for a business to select target area and target time slots to advertise on; displaying advertisement in the customer user interface for customers whose shipping destination falls in the target area for target time slots.

Claims

The scope of the invention is defined by the following claims. What is claimed is:

1. A method to arrange for collective delivery amongst customers and advertise on delivery time slots, comprising:

providing a user interface and process for a customer to specify shipping destination, view delivery time slots information and select a delivery time slot;

in dependence upon a shipping address added by a customer, clustering shipping destinations eligible for collective delivery;

in dependence upon a shipping destination specified for an order, providing a customer with derived collective delivery time slots information including time duration, charge and associated advertisements;

in dependence upon a delivery arrangement confirmed by a customer, updating collective delivery time slots information.

2. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

given an address, determining which cluster of shipping points to add the address to; if no cluster is found for the address, initialize a new cluster with that shipping address.

3. The method of claim 1, further comprising retrieving relevant orders, shipment instructions, delivery policy and advertisement arrangements associated with a cluster of shipping points.

4. The method of claim 1, further comprising determining delivery charges and associated advertisements for all time slots, given order information and a cluster of shipping points where the address for the order is associated to, wherein the cluster and associated data is determined by method from claim 2 and claim 3.

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5. The method of claim 1, further comprising presenting collective delivery time slots information derived from method in claim 4 to a customer through graphical user interface.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising storing orders and shipment instructions in a computer readable medium, so that such information may be retrieved by the method of claim 3.

7. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

receiving instructions from a business to advertise on desired time slots for desired shipping destinations;

in dependence upon agreement to advertise, displaying advertisements together with other time slot information to customers whose shipping destinations are within the advertised shipping destinations, for advertised time slots;

storing advertisement arrangements in a computer readable medium so that such information may be retrieved by method from claim 3.

8. A system for arranging collective delivery and advertising on delivery time slots, comprising:

a computation device operable for a customer to enter an address, retrieve and display time slots information, and select delivery time slot;

a computation device operable for a business to select shipping destinations and delivery time slots to advertise;

a computation device operable to cluster collective delivery shipping destinations;

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SUBSTITUTE SHEETS (RULE 26) a computation device operable to derive collective delivery time slots information including time duration, charge and associated advertisements upon user request to view delivery time slots;

a computation device operable to update collective delivery time slots information upon receiving user shipment confirmation and associated information;

a delivery vehicle operable to pick up and delivery items;

9. The system of claim 8, further comprising a computation device operable to retrieve relevant orders, shipping instructions, delivery policy and advertisement arrangements associated with a cluster of shipping points.

10. The system of claim 8, further comprising a computation device operable to compute delivery charge and aggregate associated advertisements for all time slots, given order information and a cluster of shipping points where the address for the order is associated to.

11. The system of claim 8, further comprising a computation device operable to store orders and shipment instructions in a computer readable medium, so that such information may be retrieved in accordance with claim 9.

12. The system of claim 8, further comprising a computation device operable to store advertisement arrangements from a business in a computer readable medium so that such information may be retrieved in accordance with claim 9.

13. A computer readable medium storing computer code that when executed enables the device to be operable to arrange collective delivery and advertise on delivery time slots, the computer readable medium comprising:

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SUBSTITUTE SHEETS (RULE 26) code for providing a graphical user interface which allows customer to enter an address, retrieve and display time slots information, and select delivery time slot;

code for providing a graphical user interface for a business to select shipping destinations and delivery time slots to advertise;

code for clustering collective delivery shipping destinations and storing updated clusters;

code for deriving collective delivery time slots information including time duration, charge and associated advertisements upon user request to view delivery time slots; code for updating collective delivery time slots information upon receiving user shipment confirmation and associated information;

14. The computer readable medium of claim 13 further comprising data such as shipping addresses, clusters, order, shipping instructions, delivery policy and advertisement arrangements.

15. The computer readable medium of claim 13 further comprising code for retrieving relevant orders, shipping instructions, delivery policy and advertisement arrangements associated with a cluster of shipping points.

16. The computer readable medium of claim 13 further comprising code to compute delivery charge and aggregate associated advertisements for all time slots, given order information and a cluster of shipping points for associated with that order.

17. The computer readable medium of claim 13 further comprising code for storing orders and shipment instructions in a computer readable medium described in claim 14.

18. The computer readable medium of claim 13 further comprising code for storing advertisement arrangements in a computer readable medium described in claim 14.

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