Overview

The Route Planner lets you build a quote's trip visually on a Google map. Instead of typing stops blind, you can lay out where the trip starts, the customer stops along the way, and where it ends, then see the pins and driving directions on a map — along with the distance and travel time for each leg.

It also makes the empty running on a trip obvious: the legs between customer stops are drawn separately from the "deadhead" legs (depot to the first pick-up, and the last drop-off back to the depot), so you can see at a glance which parts of the trip earn revenue and which don't.

• Plan a trip on a map while you build the quote
• Choose whether the trip starts and ends at a Depot or a Boarding Point
• Add, remove and reorder customer stops
• See driving distance and time for every leg
• Tell revenue legs apart from empty (deadhead) running at a glance
• Add or edit boarding points without leaving the planner

❕Note: The map, distances and travel times rely on each boarding point having GPS coordinates. If a boarding point is missing its coordinates, you can edit it from the planner (see Adding or editing a boarding point from a stop) to set them.

Availability

The Route Planner is switched on for your organisation by the Triple D Software support team. When it is enabled, a Route Planner button appears on a trip's Routes section in Manage Quote. If you don't see the button and you'd like to use the feature, please contact the Triple D support team to have it enabled.

Opening the Route Planner

1. Open a quote in Manage Quote and go to the trip's Routes section.
2. Click Route Planner.

What you see depends on the quote:

• A brand-new quote opens with your depot already selected as both the Start and the End, and an empty stops table ready to fill in.
• A quote that already has routes opens with those routes listed in the stops table, and the map showing the pins and the driving directions between them. If you previously chose a non-depot start or end, that choice is restored.

Choosing where the trip starts and ends

The Start row (marked with an S badge) and the End row (marked with an E badge) sit above and below the stops table.

1. For Start Type (or End Type), choose either:
   • Depot — pick the depot from the Start Depot / End Depot list.
   • Boarding Point — search for and select a boarding point in Start Location / End Location.
2. Only the field that applies to your choice is active — choosing Depot shows the depot list, choosing Boarding Point shows the boarding-point search.

Why start or end at a boarding point?

Choosing a Depot is the usual starting point. You would switch the start or end to a Boarding Point when you know a bus will already be at that location — this lets you build a more competitive quote, because the customer doesn't have to pay for the empty run out from the depot and back.

Example: You're quoting a school for a midday charter. You know the operator already runs a school service that drops students at that school each morning, so a bus and driver are on site before the charter begins. By setting the trip to start (and finish) at the school rather than the depot, that same bus and driver can pick up the charter directly — saving the customer the cost of the usual depot-to-site and site-to-depot running.

❕Important: Choosing a boarding point start or end only affects the distance and travel times used to build the quote — it does not carry through to the job when the quote is booked. If you have quoted on the basis of a continuation (reusing a bus and driver already at that location), record this in the Operations Notes field on the quote so the allocators know to allocate accordingly.

Adding and ordering stops

Each customer stop appears as a numbered row (1, 2, 3…) so you can match it to its pin on the map.

1. Click Add Stop to add a row, then search for the boarding point in the Location field.
2. Optionally enter an Arrive and Depart time for the stop.
3. Use Move up and Move down to reorder the stops, or Remove to delete one.

❕Note: The Start and End rows are always shown with S and E badges so they're easy to tell apart from the numbered customer stops.

Adding or editing a boarding point from a stop

You can create or update a boarding point without leaving the Route Planner. This is also how you add GPS coordinates to a boarding point that's missing them, so it appears on the map.

Add a new boarding point

1. On a stop row, click the add icon ➕ (Add Boarding Point).
2. The standard Create Boarding Point screen opens. Enter the details and save.
3. The new boarding point is created, automatically selected on that stop, and its pin appears on the map.

Edit an existing boarding point

1. On a stop that already has a boarding point, click the edit icon ✏️ (Edit Boarding Point). This sits next to the add icon, before the show/hide (eye) control.

   ❕Note: The edit icon only appears once a boarding point has been selected on that stop. Empty stops don't show it.

2. The boarding point opens pre-filled with its current details. Change any details you need, and drag its location pin to a new spot on the map.

3. Click save. The map pin and the route's distances and times update straight away.

❕Note: Editing a boarding point is global. The edit screen reminds you that "Changes apply to this boarding point everywhere it's used, not just this quote." After you save, every place in the trip that uses that boarding point — other stops, and the start or end — shows the updated location.

Only the fields you actually change are updated; anything you leave untouched (such as customer notes) is kept. Cancelling out of the add or edit screen leaves the trip and the boarding point unchanged.

Reading the map

• Customer legs (between customer stops) are drawn as a solid blue line. Deadhead legs (the empty running to and from the depot) are drawn as a dashed orange line, so revenue legs and empty running are easy to tell apart. Deadhead lines never sit on top of the customer lines.
• The map zooms to fit the whole trip when it loads, without zooming in too far when stops are close together.
• When two stops are at the same location, their pins merge into a single pin with a combined label (for example, S,1) instead of overlapping.
• To hide a particular leg from the map, click the eye icon 👁 on that stop (or on the Start row). Click it again to show the leg.

❕Important: Google Maps directions are for general road vehicles and do not account for heavy-vehicle access. A suggested route may not be suitable for buses — for example, it may include low bridges, height or weight limits, or narrow roads. Always check that a route is appropriate for the vehicle before relying on it.

Distance, time and per-leg detail

For each leg of the trip, the planner shows the driving distance and estimated travel time, calculated from Google Maps directions. Legs are listed as From → To so you can read the trip in order, and the distances and times are totalled for the whole trip. Stops that can't be located on the map (for example, a boarding point with no GPS coordinates) are skipped rather than counted.

❕Note: These distances and times are a planning aid. If you use the kilometre-based pricing model, they are not written into the quote's pricing options automatically — but they help you work out what those values should be.

Route preferences

Expand Route Preferences to fine-tune how travel times are estimated:

• Departure Date and Departure Time — the time of day the estimate is based on (traffic varies through the day).
• Traffic Model — Best Guess, Pessimistic or Optimistic.
• Avoid Tolls, Avoid Highways, Avoid Ferries — exclude these from the suggested route.

Applying your changes

When you're happy with the trip:

• Click Apply to Quote to write the stops and the chosen start/end back to the quote's routes.
• Click Cancel to close without changing the quote.

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