Process 2.0 Pick, pack and ship the goods

At 8 am every morning, the warehouse officer collects the picking tickets from the warehouse printer and picks the required goods from the shelf. If any of the goods are not available, the warehouse officer puts back any goods they have already picked for the order and places the picking ticket in a folder on their desk labelled 'awaiting goods'. If all the goods are available, the warehouse officer takes the goods and the picking ticket to the shipping department. The shipping officer scans the sales order number from the picking ticket, and the computer displays the order on the screen. The shipping officer manually checks each item picked against the original sales order, and the picking ticket. The shipping officer also checks the name on the sales order against the names highlighted on the credit card status report. If the name on the order matches a name on the credit card status report, the goods and the picking ticket are sent back to the warehouse with a note attached indicating they cannot be shipped due to non- payment. Once they are satisfied that the credit card payment is not invalid, and that the correct items are being shipped, the shipping officer checks a box on the sales order to indicate that shipping is complete. The computer updates the sales order and inventory data. The computer also prints a delivery slip for the order on a printer in the shipping department. The shipping officer attaches the delivery slip to the goods and places them on the loading dock. Every day at 3 pm, a carrier picks up the goods from the loading dock and delivers them to the customer.

(a) What data does the shipping officer draw on when making the decision? (6 marks)

(b) Where do the data you identified in part (a) come from? (4 marks) (c) Are these data reliable, that is, is there any possibility that there could be errors in the data? (6 marks)

(d) What would be the consequences of an incorrect decision? (4 marks)