Abstract: The invention relates to automated methods for creating offers for items to a customer. According to the invention, an automated system queries an user interface of a customer's product catalog database. The user interface can be for example a www (world wide web) server of the customer's internet site, which allows searching for products available at the customer's service. The system queries each item in a set of items, and examines the resulting output from the user interface. Internet commerce sites typically allow a user to enter a query for a product, and then reply with a response document detailing the results of the query, i.e. if the queried product was found, and if any such products are presently available and possibly also in how large numbers. The system receives the response document after each query, and examines the response document to find out, if the response indicates that the customer has the queried product available or not.