System, method and apparatus for assessing the accuracy of estimated food delivery time

#The present invention relates to a system, method and apparatus for providing a restaurant service, and more particularly relates to a system, method and apparatus for assessing the accuracy of estimated food delivery time provided by restaurants within the restaurant service.

#Internet has made restaurant shopping services feasible, as diners can be given a selection of restaurants within a specified distance of their location. Food can then be delivered to them, or diners can go to the restaurant to pick up their order. Additionally, availability of Global Positioning System (“GPS”) receivers on mobile phones allows diners to locate restaurants near their physical locations and place orders from these restaurants through a restaurant service system. The placed orders are then communicated to respective serving restaurants, which will subsequently confirm reception of the orders. The serving restaurants may provide additional information, such as estimated delivery time of each order, pertaining to the orders they are serving. Such information may further be communicated to diners.

#When the orders are prepared and ready for delivery, delivery drivers pick up the orders from the restaurants, and deliver them to respective diners. To keep diners apprised of the status of their orders, various statuses pertaining to their orders are provided to the diners. Order statuses include, for example, unconfirmed by a restaurant, confirmed by the restaurant, ready-for-delivery, being delivered, five minutes from the diner's place, six minutes before or after estimated delivery time, etc. Due to various factors, the estimated delivery time for an order may not be accurate. For example, some restaurants are not skilled at accurately estimating their delivery time, or equipped with sufficient technologies for accurate estimation. As an additional example, some delivery drivers working for or associated with certain restaurants are not effective drivers. As still a further example, during busy time periods (such as 6-8 PM on Fridays) or in inclement weather, estimated delivery time can be less accurate.

#Although the characteristic features of this invention will be particularly pointed out in the claims, the invention itself, and the manner in which it may be made and used, may be better understood by referring to the following description taken in connection with the accompanying drawings forming a part hereof, wherein like reference numerals refer to like parts throughout the several views and in which:

#FIG. 1 is a simplified block diagram of a restaurant service system constructed in accordance with this disclosure;

#FIG. 2 is a flowchart depicting a process by which an order actual delivery time is retrieved from diner using SMS messages in accordance with the teachings of this disclosure;

#A person of ordinary skills in the art will appreciate that elements of the figures above are illustrated for simplicity and clarity, and are not necessarily drawn to scale. The dimensions of some elements in the figures may have been exaggerated relative to other elements to help understanding of the present teachings. Furthermore, a particular order in which certain elements, parts, components, modules, steps, actions, events and/or processes are described or illustrated may not be actually required. A person of ordinary skills in the art will appreciate that, for the purpose of simplicity and clarity of illustration, some commonly known and well-understood elements that are useful and/or necessary in a commercially feasible embodiment may not be depicted in order to provide a clear view of various embodiments in accordance with the present teachings.

#Turning to the drawing figures and to FIG. 1 in particular, a restaurant service system 100 that provides assessment of the accuracy of estimated delivery time is shown. The illustrated system 100 provides for real time information exchange between a restaurant server 34, a database 104 (such as an Oracle database or Microsoft SQL database), a restaurant on-site service appliance (“OSA”) 36, an order server 102, a driver server 108, a communication server 130, an assessment server 152, diners 116 using diner devices 126, and delivery drivers 118 using driver mobile devices 122. Both the driver server 108 and the communication server 130 are service servers. In one implementation, each of the servers 102,108,130,34,152 includes a processor, a network interface, and some amount of memory.

#Each of the diner devices 126 and the driver devices 122 can be one of the devices pictured in FIG. 11. Each of the devices in FIG. 11 includes a housing, a processor, a networking interface, a display screen, some amount of memory (such as 8 GB RAM), and some amount of storage. In one implementation, the diner devices 126 and the driver devices 122 are smart mobile phones, such as iPhone devices created by Apple, Inc., with touchscreens. Alternatively, the diner devices 126 and the driver devices 122 are tablet computers, such as iPad devices created by Apple, Inc.