| Course | MT237 Supply Chain Systems |
|---|---|
| Unit | Unit 3 |
| Paper type | Information flow analysis |
| Length | About 1,110 words, 7 pages double-spaced |
| Format | APA 7 student paper |
| School | Purdue University Global |
| Program | BS in Business Administration |
| Updated | October 2026 |
Free sample paper for MT237 Unit 3
Six Documents for One Drop-Ship Desk and the Stock Count That Does the Damage: A Unit 3 Information Flow Analysis
[Student Name]
Purdue University Global
MT237: Supply Chain Systems
Unit 3 Information Flow Analysis
[Instructor Name]
[Date]
Prairie Rise Desk Co., the retailer, the order and every time, count and cost are composite and illustrative; bracketed figures stand where system logs and the retailer's compliance reports would supply the numbers; the sources cited are real.
The Six Documents
A drop-ship sale on the retailer's website produces six electronic documents, exchanged through a translation service that converts each company's format into the other's.
The purchase order tells Prairie Rise what the shopper bought and where to ship it. The order acknowledgment confirms that Prairie Rise accepts the order. The ship notice tells the retailer the order has shipped and gives the tracking number. The invoice bills the retailer. A functional acknowledgment confirms that each document arrived intact. And the inventory feed, separate from any order, tells the retailer how many of each desk model Prairie Rise has available to sell.
One Order, Timed
The analysis follows one order through the system logs. A shopper buys a desk at 7:40 p.m. on a Tuesday. The retailer's system collects the evening's orders into purchase orders in a batch at 11 p.m. The translation service picks them up at about 3:20 a.m. Prairie Rise's planning system imports them at 6 a.m., and the acknowledgment goes back at 6:15. The warehouse releases the order for picking at 8 a.m., the desk is kitted and labeled by late morning, and the parcel carrier collects it at 3 p.m.
The ship notice, however, waits for an evening batch and leaves at 9 p.m. The retailer loads ship notices into its customer email system the next morning, so the shopper learns the desk has shipped at about 7 a.m. Thursday, more than a day after it left the dock and about thirty-five hours after she bought it.
Most of that time is batching, not work. Picking and packing take about two hours, and the carrier's ride to the sorting hub a few more. The rest is documents waiting for scheduled jobs on one side or the other.
Why the Ship Notice Matters
A shopper who hears nothing for a day assumes the worst, and the retailer's customer service receives the call. The retailer tracks how quickly suppliers send ship notices, and Prairie Rise's average of about twelve hours after pickup is close to the retailer's limit. Sending the ship notice when the carrier scans the package, rather than in an evening batch, would cut that to minutes at almost no cost.
The Inventory Feed
The inventory feed is the more damaging document. The feed goes out each morning before six and lists available stock for each model. The retailer's website shows that number all day, subtracting its own sales as they happen but knowing nothing about Prairie Rise's sales on its own website or to dealers. When a popular model runs low, the retailer's count drifts above reality as the day goes on.
Last year Prairie Rise received about [22,800] drop-ship orders from the retailer. About [410] of them, roughly 1.8 percent, could not be filled because the model had sold out after the morning feed, and Prairie Rise had to cancel them. Most fell on popular models in the January and back-to-school peaks.
What the Stale Count Costs
Each cancellation costs Prairie Rise three ways. The retailer charges a [$25] compliance fee for every canceled order, about [$10,250] last year. Prairie Rise loses the margin on the sale, about [$95] a desk, though some shoppers reorder later; if half are lost for good, that is about [$19,500]. And the retailer's supplier scorecard counts cancellations, which affects how prominently Prairie Rise's desks appear on the website. Cachon and Fisher (2000), modeling a supplier and its retailers, found that the value of sharing information depends on how it changes decisions, and here a fresher count would change the one decision that matters most, whether the website keeps selling a model.
A stock count that is right at five in the morning can be wrong by lunchtime.
Why Prairie Rise's Own Sales Make It Worse
The overselling would be smaller if the retailer were Prairie Rise's only channel. But about [40] percent of the company's desks sell on its own website and through dealers, and those sales draw down the same warehouse stock without the retailer knowing. On a busy January day, Prairie Rise's own website may sell fifty desks of a popular model between the 5 a.m. feed and the afternoon, all invisible to the retailer. The more successful Prairie Rise's own channels become, the more often the retailer's count will be wrong. That is an argument for fixing the feed now, before the company's planned spring promotion on its own site.
The Options
Three changes would reduce the damage. Sending the inventory feed every hour would shrink the window of stale data from up to a day to under an hour; the translation service charges about [$150] a month more for hourly transmissions. Holding back a small buffer, telling the retailer that a model has, say, five fewer units than it does, would stop most overselling at no system cost but would sometimes show a model as sold out when a few remain. And sending an urgent update whenever a model falls below a set level, a threshold alert, would combine both approaches.
Lee and Whang (2000) argued that the benefits of information sharing depend as much on frequency and timeliness as on the information itself, and the hourly feed is the change that addresses timeliness directly.
Recommendation
Prairie Rise should send the inventory feed hourly, add a threshold alert when any model falls below [twenty] units, and send ship notices on the carrier's pickup scan. The hourly feed and alert would cost about [$1,800] a year; if they cut cancellations from about 410 to about 40, they would save about [$9,250] in fees and about [$17,600] in margin, a net of about [$25,000] a year. Chopra and Meindl (2019) note that supply chain information is valuable only if it is accurate, timely and available where decisions are made, and the retailer's website is where this decision is made.
Limits
The cancellation estimate assumes the retailer's website reads the new feed within minutes; if the retailer itself updates its site only a few times a day, the benefit would be smaller. Prairie Rise should confirm the retailer's update schedule before paying for hourly transmissions, and should track cancellations for three months after the change.
References
Cachon, G. P., & Fisher, M. (2000). Supply chain inventory management and the value of shared information. Management Science, 46(8), 1032-1048. https://doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.46.8.1032.12029
Chopra, S., & Meindl, P. (2019). Supply chain management: Strategy, planning, and operation (7th ed.). Pearson.
Lee, H. L., & Whang, S. (2000). Information sharing in a supply chain. International Journal of Manufacturing Technology and Management, 1(1), 79-93. https://doi.org/10.1504/IJMTM.2000.001329
MT237 Unit 3 instructions, in plain terms
Unit 3 of MT 237 follows the documents two trading partners exchange, from orders and confirmations to stock and shipping status. Name each document, using electronic data interchange transaction names if the course text does, and say what decision each one supports. Then time one real or composite transaction through every system, separating work time from time spent waiting for scheduled batches. Most delay is usually batching. Identify the document whose staleness or delay costs the most, estimate that cost from counts such as cancellations or late notices, and weigh options to fix it. State any condition that could reduce the benefit, such as a partner's own update schedule. Five pages is typical, built around an order timeline and a list of the documents, citing information sharing research in APA 7.
How this MT237 Unit 3 example is built
The analysis lists the six documents and the decision each supports. A timed walk through one order shows how batching turns two hours of work into about thirty-five hours before the shopper hears anything, and a margin note marks schedules rather than the warehouse as the cause. A short section explains why late ship notices matter to the retailer's scorecard. The inventory feed section explains how the morning count drifts as the day goes on, and a further section shows the company's own website and dealer sales making it worse. The cost section counts cancellations and prices fees and lost margin, citing Cachon and Fisher, and the highlighted line contrasts a correct count at five with a wrong one by lunch. Options are weighed, Lee and Whang support timeliness, and the recommendation and limits close it with a second note.
Where the points sit in the MT237 Unit 3 rubric
Information flow analyses are typically graded on accurate document descriptions, careful timing and a credible cost estimate. Naming the documents and what each decides shows command of the topic. Timing one transaction through every batch, with times stated, earns more than a general claim that data is slow. Graders reward analyses that find the costliest document and price its damage from counts. Each fix should be priced against the cancellations it would prevent, and a limit or condition on the benefit shows honesty. Clear timelines and tables help. The Cachon and Fisher model and the Lee and Whang paper need correct entries, and any timestamp not taken from a log should be labeled an estimate.
Common MT237 Unit 3 mistakes, and how to avoid them
Information flow papers often go wrong by listing transaction codes without explaining what decisions they drive. Another common weakness is describing delays without timing them. Some writers focus on the order documents and miss the stock feed or forecast data that does more harm. Others propose real-time integration without pricing it or checking whether the partner can use faster data. Cost estimates are sometimes missing. Watch the difference between business hours and clock hours in timelines. If you work with a company's order system, its logs can supply the timestamps. Our writers can take one order's timestamps and the documents you know about and help find where the hours go.
Get an MT237 Unit 3 example written to your instructions
Which order should the analysis follow? Describe it, or forward the Unit 3 case with its rubric, and the documents behind that order come back timed, tabled and priced. No charge applies to a first sample, which takes 24-48h. Transaction details absent from the case get stated assumptions, easy for a reader to replace. The paper above is an original model document written by our desk, not a submitted student paper and not an official Purdue University Global document.
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MT237 Unit 3 questions, answered
What is an information flow analysis in a supply chain course?
A study of how orders, confirmations, status updates and payments move between the parties, measured as carefully as the movement of goods. It usually asks who sends each piece of information, what triggers it, how long it takes to arrive and what the receiver does with it. The point is to find where a delay or error in data causes a physical problem.
Do the EDI transaction numbers need to appear in the paper?
Where the course text uses them, using them correctly signals understanding, and a glossary keeps them readable. Plain names alone are acceptable in many sections, provided each document is described accurately. What loses marks is a number attached to the wrong document, because instructors who have worked with EDI notice it at once.
How is the cost of stale inventory information estimated?
Count the orders accepted for stock that was already gone, then price each one: any fee the retailer charges the supplier for cancellations, plus the margin lost when a disappointed buyer goes elsewhere. The example assumes half of those buyers are lost. Assumptions like that drive the result more than the arithmetic does, so they belong in plain view.
Where can I find a free MT237 Unit 3 sample paper?
The full MT237 Unit 3 information flow analysis is on this page. It times six electronic documents for one drop-ship desk order, prices a once-a-day stock feed and recommends hourly updates, with margin notes.
Why does the shopper wait so long to hear the desk shipped?
The ship notice waits for a 9 p.m. batch and the retailer loads it into its customer emails the next morning, so the shopper hears about a desk that left the dock more than a day earlier.