Pneumatic transport delivery control

摘要

The presented inventions seek to create a verifiable and closed loop chain-of-custody for a specific transaction in a pneumatic tube transport system while allowing a sender and recipient to perform asynchronous activity. That is, one aspect the presented inventions allows a sender to securely send a carrier to a desired recipient while allowing the desired recipient to receive the secured carrier at a convenient time and/or location without tying up system resources. Another aspect improves the physical barriers between high value payloads and the unintended recipients. This is done in part by introducing randomness into the carrier delivery process such that no member of the general public or facility staff knows the location and/or delivery time of a secured carrier without having access to specific database records indicating the current location and/or delivery status of the secured carrier.

主权项

1. A method for use in a computerized controller for operating a pneumatic carrier system that includes a plurality of user stations, pneumatic tubes and transfer devices, comprising:
receiving a secured carrier transaction request from a sending user for a carrier to be dispatched from an originating user station; generating control signals to move the carrier from the originating user station to an intermediate storage location within the pneumatic carrier system; receiving an input from the sending user identifying a receiving user who is a desired recipient of the carrier; sending a message to a user communication device associated with the receiving user; maintaining the carrier within the pneumatic carrier system while awaiting a response signal from the receiving user; receiving the response signal from the receiving user, where the response signal indicates the receiving user is available to receive the carrier; and based on the response signal generating control signals to effect delivery of the carrier, via the pneumatic system, to a destination location associated with the receiving user.