Method for processing a list of customer orders in a customer-order preparing system and corresponding customer-order preparing system

A method for processing a list of customer orders in a customer-order preparing system, each customer order comprising one or more customer-order lines, each customer-order line comprising a customer-order identifier, a reference and a quantity of unit loads, and a level of priority, said customer-order preparing system comprising a control system and at least one preparing station receiving:

• source loads, each containing unit loads of one or more of the references, and
• shipping loads, each intended to contain the unit loads of one of the customer orders,
• said at least one preparing station comprising:
• a picking position that is single and configured to enable a picking, from one of the source loads, of at least one unit load of one of the references in compliance with one of the customer-order lines;
• an insertion position that is single and configured to enable an insertion, into one of the shipping loads, of said at least one picked unit load;
• and
• a recirculation, configured to enable certain of the shipping loads to be placed several times in the insertion position;
• wherein the method comprises the following steps performed by the control system:
• selecting a reference present in the greatest number of customer-order lines among all the customer-order lines of said list of customer orders;
• determining a set E of all the NE customer orders each containing a customer-order line containing said selected reference;
• creating a group G of N customer orders that are either the NE customer orders, if NE≤Nmax with Nmax being a predetermined threshold, or the Nmax first customer orders resulting from a sorting of the NE customer orders according to a decreasing sequential order of the level of priority, if NE>Nmax;
• building a list LC of the totality of the K customer-order lines contained in the N customer orders of the group G, in complying with the following rules:
• if several of the K customer-order lines contain an identical reference, they succeed one another in the list LC in the form of a sub-list;
• the N customer-order lines included in the sub-list corresponding to said selected reference contain N different customer-order identifiers in a given sequential order;
• and
• the customer-order lines not included in the sub-list corresponding to the selected reference contain customer-order identifiers, among the N customer-order identifiers, in a sequential order consistent with the given sequential order set in a loop;
• and
• controlling the customer-order preparing system to bring source loads to the picking position and shipping loads to the insertion position and to make the shipping loads recirculate up to the insertion position, according to the list LC.