PlumbingBossPro Blog — Plumbing Software

The Dispatch Board: Putting Plumbing Calls on the Right Van in the Right Order

A lot of small plumbing shops dispatch from a whiteboard by the door. Each van gets a column, each call gets a line, and the order gets decided in the parking lot. It works until a call runs long, a tech is out sick, or the owner is not there to explain why the board says what it says. The dispatch board in plumbing software is the same idea, without the marker smudges.

Where Dispatch Starts

Jobs come to the dispatch board from the Waiting List, as covered in The Waiting List: Every Plumbing Visit That Came Due on One Map. The office picks the visits that make sense for a day and a van and sends them over.

In PlumbingBossPro, the dispatch board is the Scheduled List. It shows jobs by day. You can filter it by van to see one tech's day at a time, or look at the whole shop at once.

Assigning Jobs to Vans

Every employee can be assigned to a van, and every job on the board belongs to a van. That is what puts the job on the right tech's phone.

A common setup for a small plumbing company:

• Van 1: repairs and drains. Service calls, clogs, leaks, toilets, faucets, disposals.
• Van 2: water heaters and maintenance. Flushes, replacements, softener service, backflow tests.
• Van 3, if you have one: commercial accounts, like restaurant grease-line jetting on a regular cycle.

Splitting by type of work means each van carries the right stock and each tech gets good at their kind of day. When one van has a light day, it can pick up jobs from the other.

Auto-Routing From the Shop

Once a van has its jobs, they need an order. The board can auto-route each van from the shop in two ways:

• Closest First — start near the shop and work outward. Good when you want early stops done quickly and room for calls later in the day.
• Furthest First — drive out to the far end first and work back toward the shop. Good when the van needs to end the day near the supply house or home base.

Auto-routing gives you a sensible starting order in one click. From there, the office can set the route order by hand when something needs to come first, like a customer who has to leave for work by ten or a restaurant that wants the jetting done before lunch prep.

The Same Order on the Tech's Phone

Whatever order the board shows is the order the tech sees in the app. When the office moves a job, the tech's list follows. There is no separate text to send saying “swap stops 3 and 4.”

This matters most when the day changes. Say a burst supply line comes in at 11. The office drops it onto Van 1, moves it to the top, and the tech sees it as the next stop. The rest of Van 1's day slides down. If something has to move to tomorrow, it goes back to the list without getting lost. The tech side of this is covered in The Plumbing Tech App: What Your Plumber Sees on the Phone at Every Stop.

Saved Views and Route Sheets

Two smaller features earn their place on a busy morning.

Saved views let the office keep the layouts it uses all the time, such as “Van 2 this week” or “all vans tomorrow,” and open them in one click instead of setting the filters every time.

Printed route sheets are for the tech who still likes paper on the dashboard, or for a day when you want a copy of the plan on the clipboard. The tech app is the live version, and the sheet is a backup.

Seeing the Day as It Happens

Dispatch does not end when the vans leave. As techs tap Start and Complete, the office sees progress. Skips arrive with the tech's note, such as “Nobody home, basement locked,” so the office can text the customer and reschedule. Crew GPS shows each van on the office map, which helps when a new call comes in and you need to know who is closest.

Customers see their side of it too. Automatic texts go out when the tech is on the way and when they arrive, and the customer app shows their place in the route.

Dispatch Habits for a Small Shop

• Build tomorrow today. Set the next day's routes in the afternoon so the night-before texts go out correctly.
• Leave room on the repair van. Service calls will come in. Do not fill Van 1 to the last minute.
• Use the map. Group nearby visits from the Waiting List before routing.
• Trust the board. Once techs see the board and the phone always match, the whiteboard can come down.

For how dispatch fits with equipment records, the tech app and billing, see the PlumbingBossPro plumbing software page.