Transport planning in Excel: when does it stop working?

Excel doesn't give out at a number of vehicles, but at the number of people who need the file at the same time

A planner who knows his customers by heart plans faster in Excel than in most software packages. He knows the distribution centre in Zaandam wants unloading finished before six o'clock and that vehicle 14 has a tail lift. As long as that knowledge sits in one head and the file is on one screen, there's little wrong with a spreadsheet.

It goes wrong as soon as a second planner, the finance team, a driver or a client needs the same information. Excel has no order number that runs through the chain, no integration with the on-board computer and no concept of loading metres or time windows. Everything the file doesn't know, someone has to keep track of. The six signs below are variations on that one problem.

1. Several planners work in one file

   As soon as a second planner joins, the "read-only" message appears and copies pop up with names like planning_mon_v2_final.xlsx. A few times a day, someone is asked who has the latest version. A shared file in OneDrive helps against locking, not against two people editing the same row at once. Sound familiar? Then you lack a single source where everyone sees the same trip.

2. Trips appear twice or go missing

   An order is copied to another day and not deleted from the original day. Two vehicles drive to the same delivery address, or a driver turns up at a customer who was already served yesterday. The cause is almost always copying and pasting rows without an order number: nothing checks whether an order has already been scheduled. Sound familiar? Every trip should have one order number that can only appear in one place. That is the first rule a planning tool does enforce.

3. No integration with the on-board computer or TMS

   The planner retypes the trip into the on-board computer (Webfleet, Trimble, Transics or another system), or sends the driver a photo of the planning board via WhatsApp. The status comes back by phone: "I'm at the customer", "I'm done". Finance only hears about it when the trip sheet is handed in on Friday. Sound familiar? Then every trip is entered twice and the feedback arrives a day late. How such an integration works is explained under transport planning API.

4. Loading metres and time windows are kept track of in people's heads

   A 13.6-metre trailer has a fixed capacity, and the 07:00 to 09:00 time window at a customer is in a comment on a cell. Excel doesn't add up the loading metres and doesn't warn you when a stop falls outside the window. The planner does that himself, until the day a replacement makes the schedule. Sound familiar? Rules that only exist in the planner's head are the first thing to write down, even if you stay in Excel for a while longer.

5. Changes spread by phone

   At half past three a client calls to say tomorrow's load is moving back a day. The planner updates the file, calls the driver, emails the customer and forgets finance, who invoice the next morning on the old date. One change takes four actions and still results in an error. Sound familiar? Count the changes per day for a week. That number says more about whether you need a system than the number of vehicles does.

6. Reporting takes a day a week

   Load factor, empty kilometres and revenue per vehicle are questions the board asks every month. The answer comes from a pivot table that someone builds on Friday from the daily sheets, topped up with an export from the accounting package. As soon as one sheet has a different column order, the table no longer adds up.

There are four routes, and the first costs no software

If you recognise the signals, you don't have to buy a package straight away. The routes below increase in cost and impact, and each one builds on the one before.

1. Adjusting the process

   One planner owns the file, changes after a fixed cut-off time go through that person, every trip gets an order number in its own column, and time windows and loading metres get a proper column instead of a comment. With data validation you can enforce some of the rules. This doesn't solve signals one and three, but it makes every subsequent route easier, because your data is already structured.

2. Off-the-shelf software: a TMS

   A transport management system gives you a planning board with order numbers, capacity per vehicle, time windows and an integration with the common on-board computers. For standard distribution and regular road transport, that is often the right choice, and we will tell you so in an initial conversation: we don't start a custom project if a standard package solves the problem. On our page about building a TMS, you can read which modules a TMS consists of and when standard or custom is the better fit.

3. Automation and integrations

   You keep your current planning but connect it: orders flow into the planning directly from the customer portal or via EDI, the trip goes automatically to the on-board computer and the status comes back without a phone call. This can also be done around an existing TMS that doesn't yet talk to everything. This mainly solves signals three, five and six. Which integrations remove the most manual work is covered in why transport administration takes so much time.

4. Custom

   Custom software comes into play when your trips differ from what an off-the-shelf package can handle: ADR cargo with its own checks, refrigerated transport with temperature rules, crane work, vehicle transport with loading rules, or a planning view your clients need to be able to see directly. You then build a tool that knows your rules, rather than the other way round. Custom software can take three forms, which are listed below.

1. Custom planning software

   A planning board that knows your capacity, time windows and customer agreements, connected to the on-board computer, accounting and customer portal. Built around your process. Custom transport software development · Custom software development

2. AI agents in planning

   An agent that reads orders from email, checks them against time windows and capacity and prepares a proposal for the planner to approve. The planner decides; the agent does the legwork. Building an AI agent · What AI agents do for businesses

3. OneDayBuild: a prototype first

   Not sure whether a custom planning tool will solve the problem? With OneDayBuild, after an intake we build a working prototype in one day, with a roadmap for what comes next. That way you can test the idea before starting a project. View OneDayBuild

The right route depends on how unusual your trips are, more than on the number of vehicles

A company with thirty vehicles running standard pallet distribution is usually done with a TMS and an on-board computer integration. A company with twelve vehicles doing abnormal loads with permits per trip will quickly get stuck in that same TMS. So the question isn't how many vehicles you have, but how many of your planning rules an off-the-shelf package can capture.

A practical test: write down the ten rules your planner applies every day without thinking. Think of "customer X always wants the same driver" or "refrigerated freight is never the last stop". If more than half of them don't fit the configuration of an off-the-shelf package, custom software or an extension to the package is the realistic route.

Whatever you choose, start with clean master data. Addresses, time windows, loading metres per customer and the characteristics of each vehicle are needed in every route, and right now they are scattered across the planning board, the planner's head and old emails. If your administration is growing along with your fleet, read your transport company is growing, and so is the administration for the order in which to intervene. You can work out what the manual work currently costs with the manual administration calculator.