Key takeaways
- Longer travel times and backtracking on poor routes waste working hours
- Poor scheduling erodes workforce morale and diminishes flexibility
- Route planning tools devise the most optimal routes when multiple stops are involved
- Poorly planned routes cause uneven workload distribution
- This impacts efficiency and job satisfaction
Poor route scheduling often results in longer travel times, backtracking, and unnecessary mileage, which wastes valuable working hours that could otherwise be spent on serving more delivery recipients. Poorly planned routes can cause frequent missed appointments or late arrivals, damaging customer satisfaction and forcing employees to spend extra time resolving complaints. More than 50% of customers will switch to a competitor after a single negative experience, and 73% will switch after multiple.
Ultimately, a lack of coordination can cause poor route scheduling, which in turn hampers productivity, increases operational costs and erodes workforce morale. Low morale and engagement are dangerous: businesses with highly engaged teams outperform their competitors by 147% in terms of per-share earnings. Learning and growth opportunities encourage 84% of employees to think creatively and be more productive, and companies that provide learning opportunities facilitate an environment conducive to growth.
Poor Route Scheduling diminishes flexibility
Poor scheduling diminishes flexibility, which is what over a third (37%) of employees want more of at work, a 2024 survey revealed. Indeed, a lack of flexibility at work leads to frustration. Automating routine tasks, which can help with route scheduling, saves an average of 3.3 hours per week. It boosts productivity, according to 78% of workers. Almost three-quarters (69%) of employees worked longer in 2024, including weekends and nights, which unsurprisingly led to burnout.
Leveraging the benefits of route optimization software
A multi stop route planner is designed to streamline route planning, devising the most optimal routes when multiple stops are involved. These route planners leverage advanced algorithms to choose the best multistop routes, significantly benefiting logistics companies and delivery services. Users reduce their fuel consumption and travel time and enhance deliveries overall. The route planner’s core function is to automate route planning for multistop deliveries, minimizing manual effort and human errors.
One of the multistop planner’s main advantages is the ability to adjust routes dynamically in real-time, accommodating sudden stops, traffic jams, and other unforeseen changes. This makes these route planners critical for logistics operations that require high efficiency. The route planner uses a map-based interface to help visualize and plan stops, ensuring each route is optimized based on time, distance, and order of priority.
The hidden costs of non-optimal route scheduling
Hidden costs are unleashed the moment efficiency in routing operations declines. Poor route management may involve a delivery truck being assigned a zigzagging route through a congested urban area. Such an inefficient route will cause more than delays and customer dissatisfaction. It can escalate hidden costs, damaging the company’s bottom line. According to studies, poor route management raises operational costs by 20% on average.
Among the most notable direct costs is increased fuel consumption. When someone plans routes manually, they risk choosing longer or slower ones, leading to longer travel times and distances, hence a higher carbon footprint and fuel consumption. Each extra mile is a direct hit to the firm’s fuel budget. Route optimization tools help identify the most efficient paths. At the same time, monitoring fuel consumption is important. Firms should track fuel use to measure route optimization’s impact and potentially identify improvement areas. As noted, the indirect hidden costs of poor route scheduling include customer dissatisfaction and loss of workforce morale.
Final thoughts
Beyond harming productivity, poorly planned routes can cause workloads to be distributed unevenly among drivers, affecting efficiency and job satisfaction. The resources invested in fixing issues cannot be used for growth of the workforce or any other growth. In addition, failure to comply with regulations like hours of service can lead to fines. Advanced route optimization tools can transform chaotic field operations into a well-coordinated, productive system.
