SDA Case Study

Music by Post Music by Post Ltd are a mail order distribution company which supply pre-recorded Compact Discs, Records, Cassette Tapes and Music Videos to their membership of 500,000. The company currently has three distinct categories of membership - Jazz, Pop and Classical. Catalogues containing details of their products are distributed on a monthly basis from which the member may make a number of selections. However, members can only select from the selection relating to their particular category of membership. Music by Post Ltd operates nationally throughout the United Kingdom employing 30 people at their Head Office in Coventry. The company also has satellite distribution centres throughout England. The Pop distribution centre is based in Manchester and employs 15 people, the Jazz distribution centre is based in Swindon employing 10 people and the Classical distribution centre (due to the high number of classical recordings produced in Germany) is located in Hull employing 15 people. Once a member has made a selection he / she completes the order form on the back of the catalogue and sends it in the pre-printed envelope to the Coventry Head Office, together with any payments that may be outstanding. The Coventry Office then sorts the payments from the orders and then the orders into the three categories (Pop, Jazz and Classical). The orders are then distributed to the appropriate centre. On receipt of the orders, the centres collect the relevant products, complete the necessary documentation, package the product and forward the recordings to the member. The company uses the Royal Mail network as a distribution channel for the recordings, to ensure that their membership get value for money. The three distribution centres have control over their stock levels. The normal practice is to set a minimum re-order level for each item, the more popular the item the higher this value is. Once the amount in stock has fallen below this level, a re-order process is initiated. Individuals items are not ordered but are stored until a viable number of orders have been generated. These are then processed into one main order which is sent to the wholesalers. The order has a delivery address of the distribution centre but an invoice address for the head office. Any time an item is out of stock, a record has to be kept. These records are collated and a report produced. Once a month, a meeting is held to analyse the reasons why Music by Post were unable to meet orders. At present the unfulfilled orders are kept in a freeform text, but a better method is required.

SDA Referral 2011

Your assignment is to produce, using the Music By Post Ltd case study as the basis:

Part 1 (50 % of the assignment mark)

You are required to produce: 1) A business case for a new system, this should outline a range of options. (a one page summary, indicating the best three options available) 2) A basic data flow diagram to represent the business showing the high level business functions, and the flows of information between the business, customers and suppliers 3) An Entity Relationship Diagram

Part 2 (50% of the assignment mark)

A database application (using any database of your choice) that will enable customers to place an order for available stock. The application also needs to be able to produce an invoice for the order. The marking scheme indicates what is expected from this section.