Routing by Territory is our recommended way to organize your routes. You can manually create your territories using the provided drawing tools. When you automatically route your orders from the Route Panel, any stops found within the boundaries of that territory will be placed on the route.
There is no limit to how large or small a defined route can be and no limit on the amount territories that can be drawn.
To create a territory, click on the green "+" icon and you will be presented with the Create Route page. The name of the route will be displayed throughout the route program so choose a name that makes sense for that region. The name of the route may contain any combination of letters, numbers, and symbols. After you've filled in the required information, select the Create button to create the route.
Color
A randomized color will default for each new route. You can change the color by clicking on the color square. From there you can either select another color by clicking through the color panel or by manually entering your desired HTML hex code.
Stop Time Padding
Stop time padding determines how many minutes will be added between stops to allow for the proper amount of time a driver will need to be at that stop to deliver the material. This value will default to what is in Settings for that branch. Changing it here will override the Settings value and be the default padding added to each stop on the route. Once the route is created, the stop time padding can be overridden at the stop level.
Vehicle
Vehicles defined on the Vehicle tab in Deliver Web can be entered here. Pleas note, this is not a required feature. If you do not define trucks, we will still track your deliveries using the device name as the truck. And if that is the case, this field can remain empty. Once a route is created, the vehicle will automatically be assigned to the route and the driver will not be prompted to select a vehicle in the Deliver app. For more information on defining vehicles, click here.
Breaks
You can pre-assign breaks to each territory. You can set the duration and if the break is mandatory, meaning it is required after so many hours for a driver to take a lunch break for example, you can define that here. Route will automatically slot the break into the appropriate stop position to satisfy the requirement. Otherwise, if no required information is set, the break will be automatically added to the beginning of the route and can be adjusted from there.
For more information on defining breaks, click here.
Required After
You can enter in a Required After time value and the break will automatically be slotted into the appropriate stop position once the route is created. For example, if by law the drivers are required a lunch break after 6 hours of driving time, this value could be added to a lunch break. Then if the route is estimated to take longer than 6 hours, the break will automatically move into the correct position instead of the beginning of the route.
Note: If there is a Required After value and the route is not estimated to meet the time, the break will not be added.
Cost Per Mile
You can enter in a cost per mile value which will determine if the route is profitable once created. Route profitability is calculated by taking the total order profit and subtracting the number of miles * cost per mile. A value entered at the territory level will be used when calculating profit unless there is a value at the vehicle level.
For more information on cost per mile, click here.
Start Time
When an order is routed, the estimated delivery time based on how long it will take to get from the previous stop to the current stop is calculated and displayed. The Start Time for the route will determine the time at which we start calculating the distance between the originating branch and the first stop. All other stops will be based on that. When creating a new route, the Start Time defaults to 6:30am. This time can be overridden anytime during route creation.
Ship Via
The Ship Via entered here will be the ship via that appears on the manifest in Eclipse. This is important on manifest close as all orders will be updated to reflect the manifest ship via. This is a real-time search in Eclipse for valid ship via's.
Driver
The Driver entered here will be the driver that appears on the manifest in Eclipse. This is important as you may have the Deliver app configured to search for manifests by driver. This is a real-time search in Eclipse for valid users.
Once you have created a Route, you will be prompted to draw the boundary. The boundary can be broad (outlining a general area) or precise (following a major highway).
1. Start by clicking anywhere on the map. A small white dot will begin the boundary.
2. Continue clicking on differently locations to form the routes boundary. A line will drawn from the previous point to the new point.
3. To complete the shape, click on the starting point of the Route
4. Click save
If multiple routes are necessary, repeat the above steps.
Editing the Shape
You may want to edit the shape of a route or move the shape to a new location after saving. One or multiple routes can be edited at a time.
As you move your cursor from one route to the next, you will see a blue pencil icon appear to the right of the route. Clicking on that pencil icon will highlight the route shape on the map. Now you can edit the shape or move to a new location.
If you want to edit multiple routes at once, you can either select the blue pencil icon to the right of each route or you can select multiple routes by clicking on the radio button to the left of each one and for all selected routes, click on the pencil icon located at the top of the page. This will highlight all selected routes at once.
Click on the Save button to save all of your changes.
If you want to select all routes, click the radio button next to the first route and then holding down the shift button, click the radio button next to the last route.
Editing Route Information
You may want to edit stop time padding, start time, ship-via, and/or driver on existing routes. To do so, double click on the route to present the Create Route screen.
To delete a route, click on the radio button located to the left of the route and then click the delete icon located at the top of the page.
Comments
"This is important on manifest close as all orders will be updated to reflect the manifest ship via. "
There is actually a branch specific control maintenance record "Do Not Change Ship Date or Ship Via on Manifest Close" and we might have it set to NOT update the Ship Date and Ship Via on Manifest Close. There is a problem with Kit items that have a large number of components that if the Manifest Close updates the order it can cause inventory issues, so to avoid this issue we have this control record set to Yes, meaning don't update the orders on Manifest Close.
Hi John,
That is fine - we are not closing the manifests from Route. That still only happens from Deliver and we respect that control file. I've found most of our customers do not have that control file set, so for most people, we wanted to stress that the ship via does matter.
Let me know if you have any more questions.
Thanks!
Robin
really should start this document by going into settings and selecting territory. mine defaulted to zip codes and when I went into territory it wouldn't allow me to do anything.
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