Batching and zoning are popular picking strategies to speed up picker-to-parts order fulfillment systems. On the negative side, these strategies require a subsequent order consolidation to separate the customer orders. In a widespread setup implemented by many online retailers put walls are applied to consolidate orders manually. A batch of orders picked under a batching and/or zoning strategy and, thus, distributed over multiple bins arrives via a conveyor system in the consolidation area. Here, a logistics worker retrieves the items from the successively arriving bins and—guided by a put-to-light mechanism—places them into the put wall. The wall is a simple reach-through rack separated into multiple shelves each temporarily dedicated to a specific customer order. On the other side of the wall reside packing workers, who empty shelves and pack completed orders into cardboard boxes. We aim to optimize the bin sequence in which a batch arrives at the consolidation area, such that the probability of starving packers waiting idle for completed orders is reduced. For this purpose, we formulate the batched order bin sequencing problem and derive suited optimization procedures. In our computational study, we investigate under which circumstances optimized bin sequences are especially valuable to reduce the packers’ idle times.

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带放置墙的手动订单合并：批处理订单箱排序问题

批处理和分区是流行的拣货策略，可以加快拣货员到零件的订单履行系统的速度。不利的一面是，这些策略要求后续的订单合并以分离客户订单。在许多在线零售商实施的广泛设置中，手动应用合并墙来合并订单。在分批和/或分区策略下拣选的一批订单因此通过多个传送箱分配，这些订单通过合并区域中的输送机系统到达。在这里，一名物流工人从相继到达的垃圾箱中取回物品，并在“放光机”的引导下将它们放到放置壁中。墙是一个简单的直通式货架，分为多个货架，每个货架暂时专用于特定的客户订单。隔离墙的另一侧是包装工人，他们清空货架并将已完成的订单包装到纸板箱中。我们的目标是优化一批到达合并区域的装箱顺序，以减少使包装工挨饿等待空闲的已完成订单的可能性。为此，我们制定了批处理订单箱排序问题，并推导了合适的优化程序。在我们的计算研究中，我们研究了在哪种情况下优化的仓位序列对于减少打包机的闲置时间特别有价值。