General Model for Cross-Docking Distribution Planning Problem with Time Window Constraints

Abstract

The research studies a cross-docking distribution planning problem that consists of manufacturers, cross-docking centers and customers. It is focused on how to distribute and receive products within time interval restrictions of each node. This means that the manufacturer has specific time intervals for releasing products to be shipped to destinations, the cross-docking centers have time intervals to receive products from manufacturers and to release them to customers, and the customers also have their time intervals for receiving the products. A mixed integer programming model is formulated to deal with this time interval restrictions by including time window constraints at each level in the network. Also, the multiple types of products and consolidation of customer orders are considered. The objective function is to minimize the total cost which combines the transportation cost and inventory cost. A LINGO program was improved from Jewpanya and Kachitvichyanukul (General model of Cross-docking distribution planning problem. In: Proceedings of the 7th international congress on logistics and SCM systems, Seoul, 2012) to efficiently handle the problem with time window constraints. Some example problems are solved to demonstrate the optimal distribution plan of the cross-docking distribution planning problem under the limitation of each time window.