Driver Scheduling 2.0

Scheduling functionality

The scheduling functionality allows users to review, create, and publish the employee schedule for a specific day with the ability to define location, availability, start time, work type, truck assignment, deadhead point, and notes.

When accessing the Scheduling page you will be shown the schedule for the last date you had viewed. A different date can be selected with the date picker in the control bar.

To allow for viewing of the most up to date information, the schedule is automatically synced every minute when not editing. The last sync time is visible to the right of the date. When you begin editing the schedule, the auto-sync becomes disabled and the sync time will display “Last Sync @ 10:34 AM - Sync off in edit mode” until you save or cancel the changes to exit editing mode.

Create a schedule

There are several ways to create a new schedule. If no schedule has been created for a day, the user can select the CREATE SCHEDULE button to open the Create Settings.

If a schedule already exists for the selected day, a new schedule can be created to completely replace the existing schedule by selecting the CREATE button in the control bar. When using the CREATE button, there are three options for building a schedule: Create Settings, Use Seniority, and Use Previous Schedule.

Create Settings

Selecting the Create Settings option allows for the most control over how you create the schedule.

Locations: The location option allows you to define specific locations to create a schedule. This is accomplished by selecting the desired location(s) from the location dropdown. If no locations are selected, a schedule will be created for all scheduling locations.

Create By: The create by option allows for selecting to use a schedule from a previous day or use the seniority order from the ADMIN section.

To create a schedule using the order from the ADMIN section, select the Seniority option.

To create a schedule from a previous schedule, select the Previous Schedule option and the desired date. Dates with a schedule will be highlighted. To also pull the start times into the new schedule, select the Include Start Times option.

Once all settings have been updated, select the BUILD SCHEDULE to create the schedule for the day. If a schedule already exists for a day, acknowledge the confirmation pop up to overwrite the existing schedule.

Use Seniority

The Use Seniority option allows a one click creation of the schedule using the employee list order from the ADMIN section for each location.

Use Previous Schedule

The Use Previous Schedule option allows a one click creation of the schedule using the employee list order from the most recent past schedule.

Modify a schedule

After the initial schedule has been created for a day you can update the information as needed. When a cell is updated the cell will be highlighted blue and requires an explicit Save to save any modifications to the schedule.

Update order of employees: Use the drag icon to move an employee to lower or higher in the list. This can also be used to move an employee between locations.

Location: The location can be updated to move the employee to a different start location.

Availability (optional): The employee availability can be updated as needed to show the employee as Unavailable, On Call, or Not Scheduled.

• Unavailable: When set, no notification will be sent to the employee. If a start time was entered for the employee it will be removed.
• On Call: When set, a notification will be sent to the employee with On Call as the start time. If a start time was entered for the employee it will be removed.
• Not Scheduled: When set, a notification will be sent to the employee with Not Scheduled as the start time. If a start time was entered for the employee it will be removed.

Start time: Update start time as needed. When a start time is entered for an employee, a notification will be sent to the employee with the start time. If the Availability is not set and no start time is entered for an employee, no notification will be sent to the employee.

Work Type: The work type can be updated as desired to show the employee as a Driver or Operator.

Truck (optional): To specify the truck for a driver, select the truck from the dropdown.

Deadhead Point (optional): To notify the driver to deadhead to a different location select the desired deadhead location from the dropdown.

Add note (optional): Select the Notes cell for an employee to add a note to the schedule notification. If the note applies to an entire location or to everyone use the APPLY TO ALL option when saving the note.

Auto-Populate On: The auto-populate option allows quicker input of start times by defining the interval to space the start times by work type. The auto-populate option is defined at the location level and when enabled for a location, entering the start time for an employee will automatically create start times for all employees with the same work type that are lower in the order.

Publish a schedule

Once a schedule is finalized, the schedule can be published by selecting one of the options under the PUBLISH button in the control bar. There are three options for publishing a schedule: Publish Settings, Publish Now, and Publish Updates.

Once a schedule is published, the delivery status for each employee will be updated with the ability to resend the employee’s schedule by selecting the delivery status.

Delivery status

• Published: schedule has been published and is in the process of being sent to the employee.
  • The following employee setup will keep the employee in the published status since a schedule will not be sent to them.
    • Employee’s availability is set as Unavailable.
    • Employee’s availability is not set and no start time is entered for the employee.
• Delivered: schedule has been delivered to the employee.
• Acknowledged: employee has acknowledged their schedule by selecting the acknowledge link or calling into the IVR system.
• Failed: schedule delivery failed for the employee.

Publish Settings

Selecting the Publish Settings option allows for the most control over how you publish the schedule.

Publish Date: The publish date option allows you to define when the schedule should be published to allow for immediately publishing the schedule or setting a future publish time.

To publish a schedule immediately, select the Publish Now option and select Overwrite All to apply for all locations.

To publish a schedule at a future time, select the Publish Later option and select the desired date and time to publish. Once set, select Overwrite All to apply the publish time to all locations.

Locations: The location option allows you to define specific locations to publish a schedule. By default all locations will be shown in the table. Locations can be removed or added as needed using the remove X or Add Location dropdown.

You can also specify unique publish times for individual locations by setting the publish date, publish time, and publish/don’t publish settings for the location.

Publish Now

The Publish Now option allows a one click publish of all schedules for the selected date.

Publish Updates

The Publish Updates option allows a one click publish of any updates made since the last publish of the schedule.

Scheduling filters

To allow for more control over your view, the scheduling filters can be used to view, create, and publish schedules for specific locations. You can access the filters by selecting the filter button  to the left of the date on the control bar. The filters also allow the ability to hide columns as desired.

Reports

The reports section provides information on delivery failures, unacknowledged schedules, and a full change log for schedules.

Delivery failures

With text message and email call outs we are able to track delivery of the message and report on the following delivery errors.

• Text message
  • Handset off/unreachable
  • Blocked
  • Bad numberUnknown error

• Email
  • Invalid email address
  • Mailbox full
  • Email too large for server
  • Bounced
  • Marked as spam
  • Unknown error

The delivery failures report provides a running total of delivery failures in comparison with historical data. The delivery failures also provide drill down functionality for more detailed information on the different delivery failures with a list of employees with failed deliveries for the date range.

Unacknowledged schedules

To help verify an employee has seen their schedule, an acknowledge link is included in the text message and email call outs. Similar to delivery failures, the reports page provides a running total of acknowledged/unacknowledged schedules in comparison to historical data. It also provides a list of employees with unacknowledged schedules for the selected date range.

Driver schedule changelog

The reports section also provides a full changelog of all schedule changes for the selected date range.

Report filters

To allow for more control over your view, the scheduling report filters can be used to look at specific locations and date ranges. You can access the filters by selecting the filter button  to the left of the date on the control bar.

There are options to select a predefined date range or selecting the date picker allows a custom date range. For custom date ranges, a start and end date must be selected.

Admin functionality

The scheduling admin functionality allows users to create default schedules for each location, define scheduling locations, setup employees, and define import settings as applicable.

The default schedules created here will be used when creating a schedule with the Use Seniority option.

Import settings

The import settings allows a client to define if the imported schedule should be auto-published and if it should overwrite existing schedules.

Please contact [e-mail] for details on available import options.

Edit locations

To provide more flexibility on schedulable locations, the edit locations option allows you to  add any point as a schedulable location. Once a point is enabled for scheduling, the location will be displayed on the ADMIN page with the ability to assign employees to it. It will also become available on the Scheduling page when creating future schedules.

Select the Edit Location button to add or remove locations seen on the scheduling page.

NOTE: A user must have permission to edit Points to use the edit locations functionality.

Add employee

The admin section has multiple ways to add an employee to the default schedule.

Add All Drivers

Selecting the Add All Drivers option will populate the default admin schedule based on the user settings defined Plant and hire date.

If no Plant is defined for a driver they will be added to the None location.

If no Hire Date is defined the driver will be placed in alphabetical order after all drivers with a Hire Date are added.

Add Single Employee

Selecting the Add Single Employee option will allow any user to be added to the default admin schedule.

To add a single employee select the user from the Employee Name dropdown and fill in any missing information. All fields except Work Type and Location will be auto-populated based on the user’s settings.

Add Employee (from a location)

From within the default admin schedule, you can add an employee to a location by selecting the Add Employee row for the location. This will open the Add Employee overlay with the location populated. This allows for a user to be added to multiple locations as needed.

Modifying the default schedule

Once the locations and employees have been added to the default schedule you can arrange the order of employees, employee locations, and employee work types as needed.

Update order of employees: Use the drag icon  to move an employee to lower or higher in the list. This can also be used to move an employee between locations.

Location: The location can be updated to move the employee to a different start location.

Work Type: The work type can be updated as desired to show the employee as a Driver or Operator.

Truck (optional): To specify a default truck for a driver, select the truck from the dropdown.

Employee setup

Along with arranging the default schedule, you can set up an employee’s hire date, desired delivery type and default truck here.

Hire Date: The hire date can be edited by selecting the hire date field and using the date picker.

Delivery Type: The available delivery types are SMS, Email, Email and SMS, and IVR.

• SMS: Sends the schedule notification to the phone number for the user via text message.
• Email: Sends the schedule notification to the email address for the user.
• Email and SMS: Sends the schedule notification to both the phone number and email address for the user.
• IVR: When IVR is enabled, all users regardless of defined delivery type will be able to retrieve their schedule through the call in system. This option allows for users to only use the IVR system for their schedule.

Phone Number (required for SMS delivery): Phone number used for text message delivery of their schedule.

Email (required for Email delivery): Email address used for email delivery of their schedule

Reorder

The Reorder option allows for setting the employee order at a location by the hire date. This will order the employees at the location with the oldest hire date first and the newest hire date last. If there are users without hire dates, they will be ordered after all users with a hire date have been placed.

 

Admin filters

The Admin filters work similar to the Scheduling filters with the ability to filter by employees and locations. It’s accessible by selecting the filter button  on the left of the control bar and includes the ability to hide columns.

Employee call outs

The employees may receive their schedule call outs through text message, email, and/or a call in system. The delivery mechanism is set in the scheduling admin section or through the user’s settings.

Text message delivery

The text message call out provides the user with the date, employee name, start time, location, truck, dead head, and notes with the ability to acknowledge receipt through the acknowledge link.

With text message call outs we are able to track delivery of the text message and report on the following delivery errors.

• Handset off/unreachable
• Blocked
• Bad number
• Unknown error

Email delivery

The email call out provides the user with the date, employee name, start time, location, truck, dead head, and notes with the ability to acknowledge receipt through the acknowledge link.

With email call outs we are able to track delivery of the email and report on the following delivery errors.

• Invalid email address
• Mailbox full
• Email too large for server
• Bounced
• Marked as spam
• Unknown error

Interactive voice response (IVR)

The IVR system allows the user to call a provided phone number and enter their user pin to retrieve their schedule. They will be provided with the date, employee name, start time, location, truck, dead head, and notes provided in the schedule. Their schedule will also be marked acknowledged upon completion of the call.

If an employee has multiple future schedules they will be provided with information for their next scheduled day only.

Please contact [e-mail] for details on enabling IVR access.

DIGITAL FLEET, LLC | [e-mail] | [phone]