Conference of the International Federation of Operational Research Societies (IFORS) in Vienna, Austria

IFORS is the International Federation of Operational Research Societies, founded in 1955 and currently composed of over 50 national societies. This year, the 24th IFORS Conference took place in Vienna, organized by the University of Vienna.

Prof. Dr. Uta Mohring presented her recent work on transparent time-dependent shipment pricing for e-fulfillment.

Fulfilling online orders quickly is increasingly important in e-commerce, with many companies offering same-day shipment to meet rising customer expectations. Yet when shipment options and fees are not aligned with fulfillment capacity, firms risk overpromising, leading to delays and customer dissatisfaction. In particular, fulfillment centers may be unable to hand over all same-day orders to parcel delivery companies by the agreed deadlines. Shipment options and fees should therefore be adapted to information that is operationally relevant and easy to communicate to customers in advance, namely the time remaining to process and ship an order. The work shows how transparent time-dependent shipment policies help e-commerce firms better align same-day demand with fulfillment capacity while maintaining fairness, simplicity, and clear communication to customers.

Link to the conference webpage: IFORS 2026
Link to the federation: IFORS.ORG
Link to the working paper: Same-day or next-day? Transparent time-dependent shipment pricing for e-fulfillment