A method for transferring articles from a long-term store to an automatically operated short-term buffer and for providing the articles ready-for-dispatch in a storage and picking system which comprises the long-term store, the automatically operated short-term buffer and a transfer system between the long-term store and the short-term buffer, comprising the steps of:
- i) providing the articles in the long-term store;
- ii) acquiring a plurality of orders, each of the plurality of orders having at least one of a plurality of order lines, wherein each of the plurality of order lines specifies an article type and a number of the articles of the article type comprised by a corresponding one of the plurality of orders, by an order-processing computer;
- iii) defining an analysis quantity comprising any number of the plurality of orders by the order-processing computer;
- iv) sorting the plurality of order lines of the analysis quantity according to a first sorting criterion in a list by the order-processing computer;
- v) selecting a previously unselected one of the plurality of order lines-sorted in the list and, if present, selecting at least one further one of the plurality of order lines of the plurality of orders of the analysis quantity which contains a same said article type as the one of the plurality of selected order lines that has been selected, by the order-processing computer;
- vi) combining the plurality of order lines selected in step v) from different ones of the plurality of orders to form one of a plurality of article groups, wherein each of the plurality of article groups comprises only the articles of one article type in each case, by the order-processing computer;
- vii) repeating steps v) and vi) until all of the plurality of order lines have been selected and assigned to the one of the plurality of article groups;
- viii) retrieving the articles of the plurality of article groups from the long-term store and transferring the articles of the plurality of article groups from the long-term store to the short-term buffer by the transfer system until all the articles of each article type contained in the analysis quantity have been transferred from the long-term store to the short-term buffer;
- ix) buffering the articles in the short-term buffer;
- x) transporting the articles of the plurality of article groups intended for one order of the plurality of orders to a picking station;
- and
- xi) providing the articles intended for the one of the plurality of orders ready-for-dispatch at the picking station.