Route planning

The planner groups confirmed deliveries by geographic area, then sequences the stops to cut driving time while working around the time window each customer was given.

#Hard deadlines and preferences

A delivery’s time window is either a hard deadline or a preference, and the planner treats them differently:

• Hard deadlines are planned first, in deadline order, and everything else is fitted around them. Even if the nearest stop would be quicker to take first, a deadline outranks it.
• Preferences are honoured where they cost nobody a promise. The planner will not, for example, send a van to a nearby stop that only opens at 3pm and leave it idling outside all morning while every later stop pays for the wait.

#Planning a day

1. 1

   Choose the day

   Open Routes and pick a date. Deliveries still waiting to be routed are listed, with any hard deadlines called out.

2. 2

   Review on the map

   Stops are plotted with colour-coded route markers, alongside live driver positions. A stop whose address cannot be placed on the map is flagged No position so you can fix it.

3. 3

   Assign a driver, then publish

   Choose who drives each van. Publish stays unavailable until a driver is assigned. Once published, the driver sees the round on their phone straight away.

4. 4

   Recall if you must

   A published round can be recalled. That is a manager’s decision, and the server enforces it as well as the screen.

#Which van takes which stop

Each van has its areas and working days (see Fleet & team). One assignment algorithm decides which van takes a stop, and the router, the fleet day board and the order page all use it — so a preview can never promise a van the router disagrees with. Before an order is routed, its page says where it would go, labelled as the prediction it is; once routed, it says where it was assigned.

On the fleet board, each van and its orders share a colour, so a busy day reads at a glance and a stop on the wrong van stands out.

#Late orders

Until the driver leaves the warehouse, an order that comes in late can be added to their round. The stops are re-planned, the delivery times updated, and the driver’s phone shows the change immediately. Once they have left, the round is theirs.