Every route company lives between two mistakes. Show up too early and you've burned a stop for a few gallons. Show up too late and the customer's tank is full and they're calling someone else.
Set the cycle by container, not by customer
A shop's oil tank and its rag drum don't fill at the same rate. If the whole customer runs on one schedule, either the tank overflows or you keep visiting for half-empty drums. Give each container its own clock. In RouteMule the choices are 3, 7, 14, 21 and 28 days.
How to pick the first number
- Start from the customer's own history if you have it, and how many gallons a typical pickup brings in
- Divide the container size by what they fill in a week
- Pick the cycle that gets you there before it's full, not at full. Leave room for a busy week
Line the stops up
Containers on the same site are cheaper to pick up together. Where you can, round them to cycles that land on the same trip: 14 and 28 days line up, 21 and 28 mostly don't. Some customers also have a preferred day, and it pays to honor that when you can.
When to change it
- You keep arriving to find it barely half full: go longer
- They keep calling in before you're due: go shorter
- Their business changed: a new bay, a new shift, a slow season
Called-in pickups are the signal. One now and then is normal. Three in a row means the cycle is wrong.
How RouteMule helps
Each container carries its own cycle and the due stops come up by themselves. Customer Performance shows who's running above or below their average, and Projections looks one month to a year ahead so you can see what's coming against what each truck can hold. See route optimization software.