Overnight Routing – Plan Overnight Routes With Driver Breaks

When you want to send one team member on the route that is too long or has too many stops to visit in one day, this team member will need to make an overnight break somewhere in the middle of the route. This will help your team members to comply with the local work schedule regulations and avoid getting fatigued. For example, you may conduct a marketing campaign in a particular city and you want one salesman to visit as many customers in this city as possible, you may run a construction business and you want a specific piece of equipment or a specialized vehicle to visit ten construction sites but this vehicle can visit only five sites a day, etc. Depending on the particular needs of your business or unique business model, Route4Me will allow you to plan optimized overnight routes where the assigned driver will be able to make an overnight break after visiting a particular number of customer addresses and then complete the remainder of the scheduled route the following day.

To plan a single route with an overnight driver break, first, go to “Plan New Route” from the navigation menu and then select one of the preferred route data import methods: Interactive Map Editor, Copy-and-Paste, Upload a File, or Import Data.

Next, go to the “Schedule” tab to set up the route’s schedule. If you want all stops on the route to have the same Service Time, define the preferred Service Time value in the corresponding field. If you want all stops on the route to inherit the Service Time defined in the imported route data spreadsheet, leave the “Service Time per stop (HH:MM)” field empty.

After setting up the route’s schedule:

1. Go to the “Optimization” tab;
2. Select the “Single Driver Route” optimization type for the system to plan and optimize a single route;
3. Select the “End route at any address” route-end option. When you select the “End route at any address” route-end option, the route will end at the most optimal address. To learn more about planning overnight routes that start and end at the same depot, visit this page.

After that, specify the rest of the route’s parameters to your preference, import route data into the system, and finish planning the route accordingly (learn more). To learn more about Route4Me’s spreadsheet requirements, visit this page.

Once the route is planned, you can see the route’s Total Time, Estimated Travel Time, Service Time, and other route parameters in this route’s Summary Table. If the route’s Total Time, Service Time, Estimated Travel Time, or any other route parameter exceeds the daily working limit, the number of stops the driver can physically visit in one day, etc., you can insert an overnight break into any preferred position on the route. To insert an overnight break into the planned route, first, go to “Insert” and then select “Insert Breaks” from the menu.

After that, in the Breaks Wizard, select the preferred break insertion method:

• After a certain number of elapsed minutes or hours: The break stop is inserted into the route at the most optimal position after the defined total elapsed time (total elapsed time = total travel time + total service time);
• After a certain number of service time: The break stop is inserted into the route at the most optimal position after the defined service time is passed (calculated based on the total service time);
• After a certain number of travel time: The break stop is inserted into the route at the most optimal position after the defined travel time is passed (calculated based on the total travel time);
• After a certain number of locations: The break stop is inserted into the route at the most optimal position after the defined stop number.

To learn more about each break insertion method, visit this page.

To insert the break stop after a certain number of elapsed minutes or hours, first, select the corresponding break type in the Breaks Wizard. After that, define the break duration and then input the Total Time of the route after which you want the break to be inserted. If you want the new break to replace all the existing breaks in the route, check the corresponding box before inserting the break.

When inserting a break after a certain number of elapsed minutes or hours, the break is inserted into the route at the most optimal position after the defined time which is calculated from the total duration of the route (total travel time + total service time).

Once the overnight break is inserted into the route, the driver will know when to stop working on the first day of the route and when to continue completing the route on the next day. Thus, the Arrival time of the inserted overnight break will be the end of the route’s first day and the Departure time of the inserted break will be the route’s second day. Since by default the overnight break is inserted into the route as a separate stop with the same address as the stop after which it is inserted, the driver will need to find a place to stay overnight on their own. Alternatively, after inserting an overnight break into the route, you can change its address to the address of a hotel, hostel, truck stop, etc. To do so, in the “Address” section of the break’s menu, input the new address of the break into the “Address” field.