cs445 - Spring 2015

Q: Do we need to worry about processing payment?

A: Not for this project.

Q: How do we invoice the customer?

A: You don't have to worry about invoicing the customer.

Q: Do we need to validate Facebook and Twitter accounts?

A: No.

Q: Do we need to keep track of deliveries?

A: Yes. We cannot charge the customer's credit card until we have delivered the goods.

Q: Do we need to keep track for inventory when we generate the daily/weekly bill of materials?

A: No. This is not an inventory management system. For purposes of this project we'll assume that the wine club owner takes care of inventory in ways that are outside our project.

Q: Do we need to keep track of changes to the delivery charge/fee?

A: Yes, you need to maintain records of past deliveries and the costs associated to those.

Q: How do we know things such as delivery charge, bottle package price, etc?

A: There are two basic options available, (i) identify setting the delivery charge, basic package price, etc. as use cases; the Admin actor should be able to set basic package price and set delivery charge. (ii) Another way is for the application to read from a configuration file when the application starts (XML, JSON, etc.). This file has information about the business such as club name, basic package price, delivery charge, etc. The first method is interactive; the second method may require a restart. You could combine the two and make it a hybrid action. For purposes of this project you'll use (i).

Q: Does VIN ship every day of the week?

A: VIN ships only Monday through Saturday morning.

Q: What format will the data (list of customers) be in?

A: XML file.

Q: Do we need to concern ourselves with the shipment date?

A: No, this is the job of our shipping partner.

Q: We know the day of delivery for a specific customer, but how do we know if it’s this week or next week, etc.?

A: We don't, it is the delivery partner’s problem to figure out which week of the month to deliver.

Q: Can a club subscriber order just boxes or individual mixes of wines, or even single bottles?

A: No, as a club member you get this month's selection box. You can always change the number of boxes you order per month.

Q: If you are a club member and change your delivery option of the month to include more than one box, can you change the mix of wines in the boxes?

A: No. The basic entity of club membership is the monthly selection box.

Q: Could the composition be something like 2 reds + 4 whites?

A: No, if we did it on an individual basis. Yes, if we redefine the basic package (i.e. 3+3, or 4+2) for everyone. The implementation choice for this project is "NO". Once you’re done coding, look back and figure out if the way you designed it will be an easy change should we want to go from 3+3 to 4+2 for example.

Q: Can a club member request an extra delivery during the month (say because they like it a lot)?

A: No. This may be a deirable feature in the future, however for this project we're not going to do it.

Q: Who produces the specific list of wines that goes in a shipment? Do you give us the test data?

A: Our wine specialists produce the monthly wine selections. You should not concern yourself with how it's done. Yes, we'll give you (wine) test data.

Q: When does the customer get their first shipment: the month they join or the month after? Say the user joins on the 31st.

A: It doesn’t matter to us. The delivery partner will determine if it’s possible to ship this months or it will have to wait until next month. We will flag new customers in the delivery list for the delivery partner so they can get expedite/fast shipping.

Q: Does the all-whites, all-reds, red-white policy apply at the box level or per shipment?

A: All boxes of a kind are identical. If you're a subscriber and you subscription indicates AR, then you'll get AR boxes whether you get your default one box per month or two or ten.

Q: If I up the order, do all boxes need to be of the same type?a

A: This question is very much related to the previous one. The answer is YES, all boxes will be identical.

Q: What states can we not ship to?

A: Here's the list of states that flat out don't allow the shipment of wine across their state lines.

• Alabama
• Arkansas
• Delaware
• Kentuky
• Massachusetts
• Mississippi
• Oklahoma
• Pensilvania
• South Dakota
• Utah

This should be enough for purposes of this project. In reality the laws in the USA are a lot messier: for example, if you live in Arizona or New Mexico, we can only ship you two cases of wine annually. Just FYI, a wine case has 12 x 750ml bottles.

Q: How long can a note be?

A: A minimum of 128 characters, a maximum of 1024.

Q: Do we create an account for somebody who lives in a state where we cannot ship?

A: No.

Q: Do we need to manage wine inventory?

A: No.

Q: Is there any situation when we reject a customer’s choice on their subscription? (e.g. AR, AW?)

A: No.

Q: Does the customer manually generate delivery cancellations, returns, exchanges, or is that all done by the customer service representative (CSR)?

A: It's all initiated by the customer, though the CSR could also do it on behalf of the customer.