Alternative for Transport planning Excel Template

Planning a delivery route or transport is still done manually at many companies. It is then quite a puzzle to get all the stops in the right order. Especially when it comes to multiple vehicles. It is difficult to oversee everything and to make (last minute) changes. Which vehicles and which drivers can you use at which stops? And how can you best take things such as time-window and all other customer wishes into account? This manual planning is usually made in Excel, using a Transport Planning Excel Template. Most the time ‘Excel planners” use a standard route planner such as Google maps for geographical support. This works fine if the transportplanning is simple. But as soon as more orders come in, more vans or trucks are used and more appointments need to be organized, this way of planning is no longer efficient. Planning a delivery route in Excel then takes too much time, it is not accurate, the chance of errors is high and changes are difficult to implement.

Disadvantages Transport Planning Excel Template

Planning a delivery route in Excel is time-consuming and error-prone. Furthermore, it is not easy to share an Excel schedule with drivers. Often there is only one person within a company who has the necessary knowledge and experience to be able to plan in this way. Besides that, the standard route planners, such as Google maps, also have a number of disadvantages:

• The addresses must be entered manually;
• Only one or a few stops can be scheduled at a time;
• It is not possible to plan several vehicles at the same time (for optimal distribution);
• You cannot use specific settings such as vehicle type, maximum load factor, necessary specific equipement or certain driver competences;
• It is not possible to schedule based on time window/time slots;
• The route/driving time calculation must be processed manually in Excel.

Making a schedule in Excel is only useful and efficient when it comes to a short route and a limited number of stops. As soon as there is some growth, the scheduling can be done much better, faster and easier.

Bumbal as an alternative for transport planning Excel template

A planning tool like Bumbal solves all the challenges of manual scheduling in one go and is affordable for SMBs. In addition, it is also easy to use and you save considerably on your planning time. Advantages of automatic delivery and transportation scheduling software include:

• The stops are easy to enter via a system link or Excel uploads;
• Planning at the touch of a button, quick and easy, even for multiple rides/vehicles and/or days;
• Specific additional settings for customers, vehicles, drivers and trips are available;
• The planning is digitally accessible to everyone, both at the office and for drivers;
• The schedule can be (automatically) changed at any time.
• All changes are therefore immediately known to everyone;
• Extra’s such as track and trace (for both the planner and the customer) are also immediately available.

Would you like to know more about the benefits of automatic planning? Contact Bas Holland – bas@bumbal.eu  for extra (online) explanation or a non-binding demo or call 013-2201600. Or fill in the contact form at www.bumbal.eu/contact.