Inventory Policy for a Deteriorating Item with Time-Varying Demand Under Trade Credit and Inflation

It’s often the case that the supplier will provide the retailer with a permissible delay period in payments, during which the supplier charges the retailer no interest and the retailer accumulates interest earned from investment return. As a type of price reduction and an alternative to price discount, trade credit helps the supplier encourage the retailer’s ordering. This paper develops an inventory replenishment model for a deteriorating item with time-varying demand and shortages, taking account of trade credit and time value of money under inflation over a finite time horizon. This model is an extension and development of the existing studies related to the inventory system considering trade credit and time value of money and offers a more general model with more flexibility and resilience to handle the situation where demand of the end market is non-decreasing with regard to time.