What is route planning?
Route planning and optimization is the process of finding the most efficient routes between the source and the destination. It is a key part of the transport management system that deals with the transportation of goods from the warehouse/hub to customers’ location.
Why is route planning essential?
Route planning is required to ensure speedy and timely delivery of consignments using minimal resources and at minimal transportation cost. Moreover, it is also needed to minimize dependency on the human and get perfection and precision in the job.
How route planning is done?
Route planning and optimization can either be done manually or using the route planning software. The former can eat up a lot of time and effort while the latter may do the job in minutes. Route planning and optimization software powered by artificial intelligence and other top technologies work on the given set of parameters. It considers the below-mentioned constraints in mind to plan the most efficient route for the delivery of goods:
- Vehicle type
The software looks into different types of vehicles to decide the type of vehicle suitable for a particular route. Besides this, it also considers order-vehicle constraints to ensure the right products get loaded to the right vehicle. For example, delivering perishables and electronics is not a good idea.
2. Delivery location
Considering the delivery location of the customer is also a major parameter most of the route planning and optimization software takes into account.
3. Historical data inspection
The route planning software also considers historical data on three levels, including customers, time of the day, and the rider.
4. Real-time traffic
The software considers real-time traffic conditions to avoid traffic congestions, roadblocks, and other problems that can impact the delivery process.
Benefits of route planning and optimization
Some of the key benefits of route planning and optimization include:
- More deliveries
With efficient route planning, your drivers can do more deliveries in a day. Route planning and optimization feature that comes as a part of most of the transportation management software also offers dynamic route planning, which can provide new routes immediately if a customer updates the delivery address or time, or cancels the order. Having such information in-time would help the drivers to do other deliveries without any delay.
2. Reduced driving time
Route planning with the help of software ensures more deliveries within the optimal time (following the route provided by the TMS), which would ultimately reduce the driving time.
3. Reduced fuel and vehicle maintenance cost
Low fuel cost and less vehicle maintenance cost are two other advantages of route planning and optimization.
4. Timely deliveries
Planning route efficiently also ensures on-time deliveries since the software can alert the driver about the traffic congestions, roadblocks, and other information beforehand.
How to choose the right route planning and optimization software?
Make sure the route planning and optimization software you want to purchase include the following features:
· Dynamic route planning to show new routes if a customer cancels the order or reschedules the delivery time, date, or address.
· Precise geocoding to convert fuzzy addresses into accurate geo coordinates on the map.
· Historical data inspection to understand delivery-related preferences and other details in advance.
· Route optimization considering the different cost variants to display the most economical routes.
· Automated route planning to show routes leveraging artificial intelligence and other popular technologies.
· Reverse logistics feature to generate the routes for the products scheduled for the return to origin.
· Multi-stop route planning and optimization to show the routes following which drivers can cover as many delivery locations as possible in one trip.
Instead of purchasing a route optimization software, you can purchase the entire transportation management software, which comes up with many other features including:
· Vehicle capacity utilization
· End-user visibility
· Last-mile delivery solution
· Dynamic route planning
To get such TMS with the aforementioned and other top-notch features, reach out to Shipsy- one of the reliable SaaS-based logistics and transportation software suite providers.
Hope the information was useful!
