Dispatch management is the difference between a fleet that dispatches every day and a fleet that learns from it. Most small fleets run dispatch on a whiteboard wiped every evening, so the same run is two hours over the limit every Tuesday and the same driver is short of days every month, and nobody can see either. A dispatch management system keeps the record: the runs as assigned and as they went, the exceptions where they happened, the rosters and the days off, so the next week is planned from figures rather than memory. This page is what the record holds, how it is kept without a full-time dispatcher, and which free sheets on this site produce its documents.
Roster the week before the days are run
The dispatch scheduling sheet takes the drivers, the trucks, the days the fleet runs, the shifts and the days off, and returns the assignments the week needs, the driver-days available, the slack after the spare days and the coverage per ten truck-shifts. A week rostered that way absorbs a sick call by moving a name; a week run from the wall rebuilds the day on the phone at five in the morning.
Run the days on the board, and record the exceptions where they happen
Each day's runs are assigned from the roster with a driver and a truck, and the board keeps every status change with its time. An exception recorded at the stop it happened at is a figure by Friday; an exception remembered on Friday is an argument. Runsheetly Pro keeps the board and its history for the whole fleet at one price.
Read the record, then change one thing
Stops per truck, minutes per run against the driving limit, exceptions per driver and per shipper, spare days used, coverage per ten truck-shifts: the record gives the figures the whiteboard never kept. Dispatch management is reading them once a week and changing one thing: a stop moved off the Tuesday run, a sixth driver's days off, a shipper's window renegotiated. The next roster is built from the corrected figures.
What a dispatch management system leaves to other tools
The hours-of-service log stays on the ELD. IFTA and the carrier's books stay with the accountant. Load tendering and EDI stay with the TMS if the fleet has one. GPS stays with the telematics if the fleet pays for it. The management system is the board and the roster and the record they leave, and a small fleet can run all of it on the free sheets before it keeps any of it in Pro.
Questions people ask about dispatch management
What is dispatch management?
Keeping the record of how the fleet's days were run (runs, rosters, exceptions) so the next week is planned from it. Runsheetly Pro keeps that record; the free sheets produce the documents.
What does a dispatch management system hold?
Trucks, drivers, loads, stops, runs with their status history, rosters with days off and spare days, and the figures they give: minutes per run, exceptions, coverage.
How often should a small fleet read the record?
Once a week, before the next roster: read the figures, change one thing, roster from the corrected figures.