Left margin indicates line numbers. Business Scenario: Interim Solutions 1 2 3 Interim Solutions sells various products (e.g., office furniture, whiteboards, projectors, computer accessories) to other businesses (not retail customers). It serves as an intermediary between its enterprise customers and several vendors. To ensure customers purchase the products from Interim Solutions, the company employs trained and knowledgeable sales representatives. These sales representatives can provide some basic, after-sales product training to customers. The sales representatives are integral to the business process. 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 The process of fulfilling an order begins when a customer places an order through an Interim Solutions sales representative. The reps. usually visit the customer at their location, write up an order, generate a billing invoice for the customer, and email a copy of the order to Interim Solutions' Warehouse. The customers remit payment at the time of purchase by writing a check which the sales rep. sends to Interim Solutions accounting department along with a copy of the order and the invoice for processing. The accounting department (i.e., one of the accountants) uses a computer with ProBank software to track customer orders and to manage its banking. Each order is input into ProBank and customer balances are closely monitored. When a check is received, it is applied to the customer's order using the ProBank software and is then scanned and recorded into ProBank's database. ProBank software then communicates with Bank of America to have the funds automatically credited to the company's (i.e., Interim Solutions) bank account. 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 After the Interim Solutions warehouse (i.e., one of the warehouse employees) receives an order from a sales representative, it starts processing the order for shipment. Any in-stock items are packaged and shipped to the customer and marked as 'shipped' on the order form. Any out-of-stock items are marked 'out of stock' on the order form. The updated order form is then sent back from the warehouse to the sales representative. If the order contained any out-of-stock items, the sales representative must notify the customer that the items are out of stock and provide an estimate of when they are expected to arrive (if known). The sales representative would then generate a Purchase Order (PO) for the back-ordered items. Since most products in the Interim Solutions inventory come from different vendors, the sales representative would look up the vendor, and send the correct vendor the PO. In addition, a copy of the PO is sent to the accounting department, since a PO is a legal promissory note to pay the vendors for products being ordered. Once the vendor receives the PO, it will package the products and send them to Interim Solutions warehouse along with an invoice. 32 33 34 35 The warehouse will receive the products into inventory and forward the vendor's invoice to the accounting department. When the accounting department receives the vendor's invoice, it will link the invoice to the open PO by entering it into ProBank. The ProBank software will then automatically send a payment to the vendor in the form of an electronic check. Refer to the Interim Solutions Scenario. An accountant uses ProBank, but she does not have enough IT training to understand the software code associated with it. True or False: ProBank would be considered a black box for the accountant. True False Refer to the fourth paragraph of the Interim Solutions scenario. Assume the points below are true: . Initial or starting State: Warehouse staff receives an order from company sales representative. Behavior or Dynamics: Warehouse staff begins to process the order they received from the sales representative. Query: Is the item shipped to the customer immediately upon receiving the order from the sales representative? of True/False Question: Based on the above information and the fourth paragr the scenario, we can conclude that paragraph four includes an example of a 'stochastic' process. True False