Hey, Where’s My Order? Intelligent Inventory Inquiry through Dynamics and A.I.

The waiting is the hardest part…especially when it comes to waiting for an order to arrive. A customer took the time to review their options, made their decision, placed their order, paid for their order, and now… they wait. And rarely patiently.

Businesses face challenges in keeping customers informed about order statuses, especially when handling high volumes of orders across multiple items and customers. Current systems require manual lookups in back-end systems, leading to delays, inefficiencies, and poor customer satisfaction. Here’s where intelligent order inquiry fueled by AI can save the day—for your customers and for your team as well. Let’s explore a use case where conversational AI is leveraged for order tracking along with Dynamics 365 Finance & Supply Chain Management.

This AI-powered solution allows end customers to inquire about order statuses, item details, and customer-specific order information using natural language: i.e., AI responds and interacts with users in a way that’s similar to how people normally communicate. And as it “talks” it learns, with the end-goal being improving customer experiences by providing quick, accurate responses to questions about orders and more. 

That’s the high-level, the benefits. Let’s take a moment, though, to dig into the specific functionality and features.

1. Natural Language Processing (NLP): Understand and interpret customer queries like "What is the status of orders with item 1234?" or "When is my order with sales order #XYZ expected to be delivered?" 
2. Data Integration with D365 F&SCM: Seamless integration with the Microsoft ERP platform to fetch real-time data related to orders, customers, and inventory items such as sales orders, statuses, and delivery estimates. 
3. Order Status Tracking: Provide up-to-date status information for items in customer orders, including statuses like “In Process,” “Shipped,” “Delivered,” and expected delivery dates. 
4. Contextual Responses: The AI provides context-rich responses like "Item 1234 is being ordered in Sales order #XYZ with status of In Process and expected delivery date of 12/1/2024." 
5. Customer-Specific Order Inquiries: End customers can also query for personalized order details like "What are my pending orders?" and receive relevant information. 

While this approach speeds and improves customer service—which improves both customer engagement and employee productivity—it also provides a means to capture and integrate more data as customer conversations can be integrated into customer records in real-time, providing a more complete picture of each customer’s wants, needs, and buying behavior.

How It Works 

1. User Query: A customer initiates a query via a chat interface using natural language (e.g., "What is the status of orders with item 1234?"). 
2. AI Processing: The conversational AI, powered by NLP models, interprets the query, identifies the key entities (item number, order status), and retrieves the relevant data from the D365 F&SCM system. 
3. Data Fetching: The AI communicates with the backend, which is integrated with D365 F&SCM, to fetch real-time order data, including sales order numbers, statuses, and delivery dates. 
4. AI Response: The AI formulates a natural language response based on the data retrieved (e.g., "Item 1234 is being ordered in Sales order #XYZ with status of In Process and expected delivery date of 12/1/2024."). 
5. Follow-up Interaction: The AI supports follow-up queries like "Can you give me more details about this sales order?" or "When was this item shipped?" 

Who benefits from AI-fueled IOI, and how?

Simply put, everyone. End-customers benefit from faster access to more accurate order information and enhanced customer service, spending less time (rather, NO time) on hold or in a queue. Customer service teams are relieved of frequent, repetitive inquiries related to order statuses and can focus on complex customer issues. (As these systems most always enable escalating more complex issues to a representative.) Across the supply chain—from raw materials to warehousing to distribution—SCM professionals benefits by leveraging a system that offers them rapid, additional insights into order processing times and delivery schedules. 

The benefits run the gamut as well:

1. Improved Customer Satisfaction: Customers receive real-time, accurate updates about their orders, reducing the need for calls or emails to customer service. 
2. Increased Efficiency: Customer service teams can handle more inquiries simultaneously without being burdened by manual lookups in ERP systems. 
3. Cost Savings: Automating order status inquiries reduces the need for human intervention, cutting operational costs and freeing up resources. 
4. Scalability: The system can handle multiple concurrent inquiries, scaling as the business grows without requiring proportional increases in customer service resources. 

Why Microsoft AI instead of others?

Microsoft has been leading the charge in AI for years now. With its partnership with OpenAI (creators of ChatGPT) and its release of Copilot, Microsoft continues set the standard for how effectively and how safely AI is put to use across most every industry.

1. Responsible AI: Microsoft's commitment to ethical AI ensures that the conversational AI is secure, respects customer privacy, and handles sensitive order data with transparency. 
2. User Experience: Its AI provides a smooth, intuitive, and natural interaction for users, with the capability to understand complex and varied queries. 
3. AI and Cloud Integration: The solution takes advantage of Azure AI services and seamlessly integrates with Microsoft’s Dynamics 365 suite, leveraging its full potential. 
4. Security and Compliance: Built on Microsoft Azure, the system adheres to industry-standard security protocols, ensuring data integrity, compliance, and privacy protection. 
5. Scalability and Extensibility: The AI solution can scale with the organization’s needs and be extended with additional capabilities, such as predictive analytics for inventory and demand forecasting. 

The solution presented here is not theoretical. It is being put to use across the global supply chain at this very moment, providing an intuitive, efficient, and scalable way to track orders in real-time, offering clear advantages for both customers and internal teams.

If you are ready to leverage the power of Microsoft AI, D365 F&SCM, and Azure to both enhance the customer experience and drive operational efficiency, Argano can help. Contact us for a free assessment on AI and IOM within your own supply chain.