Deliveries on the road

By five in the evening Kasun has been on the road for hours. Lorry 2 of Riverbank Distributors (a sample business) still has shops to reach before dark, and the office wants to know where each one is. On paper this used to mean a delivery sheet on the passenger seat, phone calls to ask "have you reached yet?", and a pile of crumpled dockets handed in at night.

This tour follows one stop on Kasun's phone: Sisira Stores on Market Street, the second of four drops on today's route.

What does the driver see on his phone?

He sees one shop at a time, with only what he needs to deliver it: the shop name and status, the address, the order and a button to call. The screen is deliberately simple. It does not ask him to type, sign or tick anything while standing in a doorway with a bag of rice on his shoulder.

Step by step

1. Kasun opens his stops for the day. At 17:00 he looks at his phone. The header reads Lorry 2 · Kasun and Stop 2 of 4. The first shop is done, and two more come after this one. He does not need the office to read the list out to him.
2. He checks which shop is next. Sisira Stores is at the top with its icon and name. Below it, three dots show the delivery's progress: to send out, on the road, delivered. The middle one is lit, so this order has left the warehouse and is on its way.
3. He reads the address. The address line in the sample says Market Street, back door after 9. Having it on the stop itself means a relief driver covering the round reads the same address as the regular one, instead of relying on memory.
4. He taps Open in maps if he is unsure of the way. The address opens in the phone's map app. For a regular route he may not need it, but on a new shop or a diversion it saves a phone call.
5. He checks what is on the order. Order number SO-1042, 13 items, total Rs 153,200, due today at 17:30. In the sample that is six bags of samba rice, four bags of red dhal and three cartons of milk powder. Knowing the count before he opens the back of the lorry means he unloads the right bags the first time.
6. He calls the shop with one tap if something has changed. Traffic at the level crossing, a shutter half down, a question about where to stack the bags: the Call Sisira Stores button rings the shop straight away. There is no number to look up.
7. He hands over and moves on. Once the goods are in, Kasun moves to stop 3. His screen does not have a Delivered button, and the line at the bottom says so plainly: the office marks deliveries done.
8. The office marks the drop delivered. Back at the office, staff mark SO-1042 as delivered. That keeps the delivery record, the invoice and any later question about shortages in one set of hands.

Why the office, not the driver, marks it delivered

It can look odd at first. Surely the person standing at the shop knows best? The reason is control over money and stock. A delivery status is tied to the invoice and to what the shop owes. If anyone on the road could change it, a mistaken tap on a bumpy road, or a drop marked done before the goods were checked, would flow straight into the shop's balance. Keeping start, complete and fail as office actions means one person is responsible for each change, and the driver can concentrate on driving.

In practice the driver and office stay in touch by phone, which most distributors already do. The difference is that the phone call is now about exceptions, not about "where are you?".

Tips for a smoother round

• Keep shop addresses complete. The driver sees the address saved for the shop. A full address, with the lane and landmark people actually use, saves more time on the road than any shortcut.
• Load the lorry in reverse stop order. If stop 4 goes on first and stop 1 last, the order on the phone matches the order in the back of the lorry.
• Use the item count as the check. Thirteen items on the screen means thirteen items off the lorry. If the count is different, call the office before leaving the shop, not at the end of the day.
• Keep the picking honest. Short lines flagged at picking in the morning mean the order on the driver's phone already reflects what is actually on the lorry. See picking the lorry load.

Common mistakes

• Treating the call button as optional. If a shop is shut, calling from the door takes ten seconds. Driving on and coming back later can cost the whole evening.
• Letting drivers take verbal changes to the order. If the shop wants two more bags of dhal, that is a new order or an edit by the office, not a bag taken from another shop's delivery.
• Marking everything delivered at the end of the day in one go. The office should mark drops as they are confirmed, so the shop balances and the delivery list are right if a shop rings.
• Overloading the round. Four shops before dark is the plan. If the phone regularly shows stop 6 of 6 at seven at night, the route needs splitting.

What to do next

Once the lorry is back, the day ends with the cash. Follow closing the day to see how Nimal counts the drawer against what the system recorded. Earlier in the afternoon, shops that owe, oldest first shows how the office decides which shops to chase, including Sisira Stores.

For the planning side of routes, vans and rep orders, read van sales and route orders. If you are setting up distribution from scratch, how to start a wholesale business covers vehicles, credit terms and stock, and stock control explains how picking and goods in keep the numbers on the lorry right.