Route Optimization is an optional feature. To find out more, or add this to your vWork account, please contact support@vworkapp.com.  A member of the vWork Team will be in touch to discuss your requirements.

Alternatively, you can read all about it in the article What is Route Optimization?

In this article

A key ingredient to making optimization work really well for your organization is planning. Part of your planning is to think about the permissions and settings that you need to enable. 

Permissions and settings are found in your account settings and in jobs and job templates. 

This article explains the:

• Required permissions and settings for optimization, and the
• Optional permissions and settings.
  
  

Required permissions and settings 

There are both required and optional permissions and settings. The required permissions are listed here. You must set these first to enable Route Optimization and ensure it will work.  

1. User Permissions

Turn on User Permissions for Administrators and Dispatchers who will prepare and run the optimizations.

See the article How do I set User Permissions for Route Optimization? to learn how to turn on these permissions.

2. Start locations

Route optimization requires a starting point for every route you want to optimize. Without this information, the optimization algorithms won’t have a point to begin working out and comparing alternative routes.

It is essential to set at least one start location parameter within vWork to run Optimization.

Start Locations can be set in three places within your vWork account: globally in the General Settings area of your vWork account, in the settings for a Group (if you have Groups enabled), or for each individual Mobile User.

The article How do I set start locations for Route Optimization? explains why you would set start locations in Global, Group, or Mobile User settings and how to do this.

3. Geocoded address

A geocoded address is when a street address, or similar, is converted to a specific latitude and longitude so it can be found on a map.

Each job in an optimization requires one or two job steps to have a geocoded address (unless it is an automated break job).  

When you create templates for jobs that will be used in Route Optimization, make sure the job steps in the template allow for at least a single geocoded address to be included when the job is created. You can also include geocoded addresses in the job template if the job always uses the same address or addresses.

For more information about geocoded addresses in vWork, see the article: Geocoded job steps and Route Optimization.

Note: There is one exception to the geocoded address requirement. This is for break jobs used to schedule automated breaks for workers in an optimized route. Break jobs do not use a geocoded address. To find out more about this please read the article: Schedule worker breaks in Route Optimization with Automated Breaks.

Optional permissions and settings  

Once you have set the required permissions and settings you will be able to run Route Optimization, but it is also a good idea to think about the optional ones. These fine-tune Route Optimization to make it work better in different situations. Once you have tried basic route optimization, you might like to come back here and take a little time to learn about these extra options.

Optional permissions and settings are listed here.

1. Capacity

Capacity is a measure of volume using a standard unit. It does not have a specific value defined in vWork. You decide what this value is depending on what your organization’s need is. For example, Capacity may represent bags of groceries, bottles of gas, or pallets of goods. It ensures the optimization makes the best use of the loading of workers or vehicles to meet the requirements of all jobs in the optimization.

You would set Capacity when:

• there are standard units for all the jobs that you want to include in the Route Optimization, 
• the size of the individual unit does not vary, although it doesn’t matter if the number of units is the same or varies between jobs, and
• there are limits to the volume each worker or vehicle, used in the optimization, can carry on a single delivery route.

For more information about capacity, see the articles:

• What is Capacity? and 
• How do I set Capacity for Route Optimization?
  

2. Tags

Tags restrict the pool of workers that can be assigned to a job based on the skills they have and the skill requirements needed to complete the job.  If tags have been added to a job, Route Optimization excludes workers that do not have the skills that match the job requirements.

There is also a special tag, called a break tag, that you can create just for Route Optimization. This is used in conjunction with break jobs to optimize scheduled breaks for workers as part of an optimized route.  

For more information about Tags and other Health and Safety features see the articles:

• How Does Health & Safety Work?  
• Health & Safety Tags: tag workers with their skills, and
• Schedule worker breaks in Route Optimization with Automated Breaks.

3. Time settings

Time settings occur in several places within vWork. Some of these put constraints around how Route Optimization calculates routes. This has both benefits and drawbacks. It is important to consider these to get the most from Route Optimization.

For more information on Time settings and their impact on Optimization see the article: How do time settings affect Route Optimization?