Patent Issued for Drive-thru system implementing location tracking (USPTO 11853959): Walgreen Co.

2024 JAN 17 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- Walgreen Co. (Deerfield, Illinois, United States) has been issued patent number 11853959, according to news reporting originating out of Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx editors.

The patent’s inventors are Eby, Nicholas L. (Downers Grove, IL, US), Weiss, Benjamin (Chicago, IL, US).

This patent was filed on August 26, 2020 and was published online on December 26, 2023.

From the background information supplied by the inventors, news correspondents obtained the following quote: “In many cases, a pharmacy customer will order a prescription refill in advance of his or her visit to the pharmacy to pick up the refill. In other cases, a prescription for an initial supply may, for example, have already been called in by the customer’s doctor. Generally, the customer’s order will then be filled, packaged, and stored until the customer visits the pharmacy to pick up the order.

“To make the prescription pickup and payment process more convenient for the customer, some pharmacies have implemented drive-thru prescription pickup services. Drive-thru prescription pickup services typically allow a customer to remain in his vehicle while being serviced at a drive-thru window to pick up his prescription. The drive-thru pickup process generally involves the customer communicating with pharmacy staff using a speaker and microphone located outside of the pharmacy at the start of a drive-thru lane. Once the pharmacy staff receives the customer information by speaking to the customer, the pharmacy staff may fill the prescription order, wait until the vehicle pulls up near a drive-thru window, hand the customer his prescription order, and process the payment.

“However, conventional drive-thru systems often suffer from inefficiencies since several may be in line in a drive-thru lane at the same time. Because some prescriptions may take longer to fill than others, pharmacy staff may need to rush to fill larger prescription orders at the expense of making other customers in line wait longer to receive their prescriptions. In addition, traditional drive-thru prescription pickup services receive customer information and prescription order information by speaking to each customer as she pulls through the drive-thru lane. This interaction further slows the pickup process, as time is needed to enter each customer’s information, lookup their prescription information, and locate the prescription order.

“As a result, streamlining the drive-thru prescription pickup process may provide additional convenience for customers but also presents several challenges.”

Supplementing the background information on this patent, NewsRx reporters also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “In some embodiments, methods, apparatus, systems, and non-transitory media are described to determine a customer’s prescription information and their position in a drive-thru lane. The drive-thru lane may have one or more transmitters installed at one or more predetermined locations. By utilizing an application installed on each customer’s mobile computing device, each mobile computing device may transmit customer information and ranging data when within range of one or more of the transmitters. The ranging data may include an indication of a range between each of the customer’s mobile computing device and one or more proximate transmitters. By correlating the customer information to prescription information from recently filled and/or called-in prescriptions (e.g., those received in the last hour), each customer’s prescription order may be retrieved. Furthermore, by analyzing the ranging data, the position of each customer in the drive-thru lane may also be determined. A drive-thru computing device is disclosed that may display each customer’s position in the drive-thru lane along with their prescription order information.

“In additional embodiments, the drive-thru computing device may receive the customer information and ranging data directly from each mobile computing device while operating in a peer-to-peer mode. In such embodiments, one or more of the mobile computing devices may communicate with one or more back-end components to retrieve each customer’s prescription order information and then transmit the prescription order information to the drive-thru computing device. In accordance with peer-to-peer communication embodiments, the retail store or pharmacy operating the drive-thru system may operate offline and without the need to access or otherwise utilize a common back-end application.

“In further embodiments, the drive-thru computing device may receive the customer information and ranging data through a communication network from one or more back-end components while operating in a network communications mode. In such embodiments, one or more of the mobile computing devices may communicate with one or more back-end components to send the customer information and/or ranging data to the back-end components. Further in accordance with these embodiments, the drive-thru computing device may retrieve each customer’s prescription order information, customer information, and ranging data from the one or more back-end components. In accordance with network communication embodiments, the retail store or pharmacy operating the drive-thru system may utilize a common back-end application running on one or more of the back-end components.

“In still additional embodiments, methods, apparatus, systems, and non-transitory media are described that utilize one or more timestamps indicating when the one or more mobile computing devices received signals transmitted by the one or more transmitters. By analyzing the timestamps and the ranging data, customer dwell times may be calculated based upon how long a customer has remained in the same position in a drive-thru lane. Furthermore, overall customer service times may be calculated through an analysis of the timestamps and an indication of when the customer’s prescription order was processed. Future service times may be predicted by performing analytics on the dwell times and/or service times. Customers may be notified in advance of visiting the retailer with an estimate of these predicted times.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A method of determining an ordered position of a mobile computing device, associated with a customer, within an order pickup system, the method comprising: receiving, by one or more processors, for each respective customer of a plurality of customers, a customer profile including (i) a photo identification associated with the customer and (ii) prescription information corresponding to a prescription order associated with the customer; receiving, by the one or more processors, for each respective customer of the plurality of customers, ranging data that is transmitted from the mobile computing device associated with the customer, the ranging data being generated in response to receiving one or more transmitted signals from one or more transmitters that are positioned at one or more locations within the order pickup system, wherein the ranging data includes a signal strength value of the one or more transmitted signals; determining, by the one or more processors, the ordered positions of the mobile computing devices associated with each of the respective customers within the order pickup system relative to one another based upon a comparison of the ranging data transmitted from each of the mobile computing devices; determining, by the one or more processors, for each respective customer of the plurality of customers, whether the photo identification of the customer is required to be verified based on a type of prescription drug included in the prescription information corresponding to the prescription order; displaying, by the one or more processors, (i) a first ordered position of a first mobile computing device, and a first prescription drug, associated with a first customer of the plurality of customers, within the order pickup system, (ii) a second ordered position of a second mobile computing device, and a second prescription drug, associated with a second customer of the plurality of customers, within the order pickup system, and (iii) that the photo identification of the first customer is required to be verified for the first prescription drug, without displaying that the photo identification of the second customer is required to be verified for the second prescription drug.

“2. The method of claim 1, wherein the customer profile includes one or more of a customer identity, a customer username, a patient identification number, a medical record, doctor contact and/or information, prescription history, health insurance information, or payment information.

“3. The method of claim 1, wherein the customer profile is transmitted from the mobile computing device.

“4. The method of claim 1, wherein receiving the customer profile and/or receiving ranging data includes receiving the customer profile and/or receiving the ranging data via one or more of: a personal area network (PAN) protocol, a local area network (LAN), a metropolitan area network (MAN), a wide area network (WAN), BLUETOOTH, Wi-Fi, a radio frequency identification (RFID) protocol, or a near field communication (NFC) protocol.

“5. The method of claim 1, wherein the order pickup system is associated with a drive-thru lane and/or a pickup location at a pharmacy location.

“6. The method of claim 1, further comprising: accessing, by the one or more processors, payment information associated with the customer; and processing a payment associated with the prescription order of the customer within the order pickup system.

“7. The method of claim 1, further comprising: receiving, by the one or more processors, (i) initial ranging data transmitted from initial mobile computing devices, associated with initial customers, for which respective ordered positions within the order pickup system have already been determined, and (ii) additional ranging data transmitted from additional mobile computing devices, associated with additional customers, within the order pickup system for which respective ordered positions have not yet been determined; and determining a respective ordered position of each of the additional mobile computing devices based upon a comparison of the initial ranging data and the additional ranging data.

“8. One or more non-transitory computer readable media having instructions that are stored thereon in a computing device to determine an ordered position of a mobile computing device, associated with a customer, within an order pickup system, and that, when executed by one or more processors, cause the computing device to: receive, for each respective customer of a plurality of customers, a customer profile that includes (i) a photo identification associated with the customer and (ii) prescription information that corresponds to a prescription order associated with the customer; receive, for each respective customer of the plurality of customers, ranging data that is transmitted from the mobile computing device associated with the customer, the ranging data being generated in response to receiving one or more transmitted signals from one or more transmitters that are positioned at one or more locations within the order pickup system, wherein the ranging data includes a signal strength value of the one or more transmitted signals; determine an ordered position of the mobile computing devices associated with each of the respective customers within the order pickup system relative to one another based upon a comparison of the ranging data transmitted from each of the mobile computing devices; determine, for each respective customer of the plurality of customers, whether the photo identification of the customer is required to be verified based on a type of prescription drug corresponding to the prescription order; and display (i) a first ordered position of a first mobile computing device, and a first prescription drug, associated with a first customer of the plurality of customers, within the order pickup system, (ii) a second ordered position of a second mobile computing device, and a second prescription drug, associated with a second customer of the plurality of customers, within the order pickup system, and (ii) that the photo identification of the first customer is required to be verified for the first prescription drug, without displaying that the photo identification of the second customer is required to be verified.

“9. The one or more non-transitory computer readable media of claim 8, wherein the customer profile includes one or more of: a customer identity, a customer username, a patient identification number, a medical record, doctor contact and/or information, prescription history, health insurance information, or payment information.

“10. The one or more non-transitory computer readable media of claim 8, wherein the customer profile and/or ranging data is received via one or more of: a personal area network (PAN) protocol, a local area network (LAN), a metropolitan area network (MAN), a wide area network (WAN), BLUETOOTH, Wi-Fi, a radio frequency identification (RFID) protocol, or a near field communication (NFC) protocol.

“11. The one or more non-transitory computer readable media of claim 8, wherein the order pickup system is associated with a drive-thru lane and/or a pickup location at a pharmacy location.

“12. The one or more non-transitory computer readable media of claim 8, further including instructions that, when executed by the one or more processors, causes the computing device to: access payment information associated with the customer; and process a payment associated with the prescription order of the customer.

“13. The one or more non-transitory computer readable media of claim 8, wherein the instructions further cause the computing device to: receive (i) initial ranging data transmitted from initial mobile computing devices, associated with initial customers, for which respective ordered positions within the order pickup system have already been determined, and (ii) additional ranging data transmitted from additional mobile computing devices, associated with additional customers, within the order pickup system for which respective ordered positions have not yet been determined; and determine a respective ordered position of each of the additional mobile computing devices based upon a comparison of the initial ranging data and the additional ranging data.”

There are additional claims. Please visit full patent to read further.

For the URL and additional information on this patent, see: Eby, Nicholas L. Drive-thru system implementing location tracking. U.S. Patent Number 11853959, filed August 26, 2020, and published online on December 26, 2023. Patent URL (for desktop use only): https://ppubs.uspto.gov/pubwebapp/external.html?q=(11853959)&db=USPAT&type=ids

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