Generation and assignment of expiration status checking tasks using a machine learning model to predict item freshness

A computer program product comprising a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having instructions encoded thereon that, when executed by a processor of a computer system, cause the computer system to perform steps comprising:

• identifying a plurality of candidate perishable items to check for expiration status at a source location associated with a source computing system;
• applying the plurality of candidate perishable items to an item freshness model to generate scores for the plurality of candidate perishable items, wherein the item freshness model comprises a machine-learning model trained by:
• accessing a set of training examples including training expiration status data for a training set of perishable items, training source expiration status requests for the training set of perishable items, and training customer complaint data for the training set of perishable items,
• applying the item freshness model to the set of training examples to generate a training output corresponding to a predicted set of scores for the training set of perishable items,
• back-propagating one or more error terms obtained from one or more loss functions to update a set of parameters of the item freshness model, and one or more of the error terms are based on a difference between a label applied to a test interaction of the set of training examples and the predicted set of scores, and
• stopping the back-propagation after the one or more loss functions satisfy one or more criteria;
• selecting, based in part on the scores, one or more of the plurality of candidate perishable items as one or more perishable items for a picker to check for expiration status;
• providing instructions to a picker client device associated with the picker to check the one or more perishable items for expiration status, wherein providing instructions to the picker client device causes the picker client device to display the instructions;
• receiving expiration status data from the picker client device describing whether each of the one or more perishable items are expired;
• and
• providing the expiration status data to the source computing system.

A computer system comprising:

• a processor;
• and
• a non-transitory computer readable storage medium having instructions encoded thereon that, when executed by the processor, cause the computer system to perform steps comprising:
• identifying a plurality of candidate perishable items to check for expiration status at a source location associated with a source computing system;
• applying the plurality of candidate perishable items to an item freshness model to generate scores for the plurality of candidate perishable items, wherein the item freshness model was trained by:
• accessing a set of training examples including training expiration status data for a training set of perishable items, training source expiration status requests for the training set of perishable items, and training customer complaint data for the training set of perishable items,
• applying the item freshness model to the set of training examples to generate a training output corresponding to a predicted set of scores for the training set of perishable items,
• back-propagating one or more error terms obtained from one or more loss functions to update a set of parameters of the item freshness model, and one or more of the error terms are based on a difference between a label applied to a test interaction of the set of training examples and the predicted set of scores, and
• stopping the back-propagation after the one or more loss functions satisfy one or more criteria;
• selecting, based in part on the scores, one or more of the plurality of candidate perishable items as one or more perishable items for a picker to check for expiration status;
• providing instructions to a picker client device associated with the picker to check the one or more perishable items for expiration status, wherein providing instructions to the picker client device causes the picker client device to display the instructions;
• receiving expiration status data from the picker client device describing whether each of the one or more perishable items are expired;
• and
• providing the expiration status data to the source computing system.