Delivery Areas and Regions: Planning Your Delivery Days

BarSight uses two settings to organize deliveries. A region is where a customer is, such as Fraser Valley or Maple Ridge. A delivery area is a run your trucks do on set days of the week, such as "Valley" on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and it covers one or more regions. Once both are set up, every delivery order lands in the right run automatically, based on the customer's region and the order's delivery date.

Before You Start

• You need edit access to Customers to add or change regions and delivery areas.
• You need access to Deliveries to see the Deliveries board. Shipping orders and assigning drivers from the board needs edit access.
• Set up your regions first. A delivery area is just a list of regions plus the days they're delivered.

How Regions and Delivery Areas Work Together

Think of it this way: the region never changes for a customer, but which run they're on depends on the day.

• Valley runs on Tuesday and Thursday and covers Fraser Valley and Maple Ridge.
• Tricity runs on Wednesday and Friday and covers Coquitlam and Maple Ridge.

A Maple Ridge customer's Tuesday order goes on the Valley run. Their Friday order goes on the Tricity run. An order for a day when no area covers their region shows up as Not Scheduled.

A region can be in as many delivery areas as you like, but only one area per day. That way there is never any doubt about which run an order belongs to.

Step-by-Step Instructions

Step 1: Add Your Regions

1. Open Customer Settings. Either go to Brewery → Deliveries and click Settings, or open any customer and click Update Settings at the top of the customer box.
2. In the Regions box, click Add Region.
3. Enter a Region Name, such as Fraser Valley, and click Add Region.
4. Repeat for each region. Use the arrows in the list to put them in the order you want them listed.

[SCREENSHOT: Customer Settings page showing the Regions box and the Delivery Areas box side by side]

Step 2: Put Customers in Their Regions

Pick whichever is quickest:

• One customer: open the customer and start typing in the Region box. Pick a region from the list, or type a new name and it's created when you save.
• Many customers: on the Customers list, tick the customers, click Bulk Actions and choose Switch Region. Leave the box blank to unassign them.
• From a spreadsheet: add a Region column to your customer import. Columns named Delivery Region, Delivery Area or Area are read as the region too. A region that doesn't exist yet is created during the import.

Step 3: Create Your Delivery Areas

1. On the Customer Settings page, click Add Area in the Delivery Areas box.
2. Enter an Area Name, such as Valley.
3. Tick the Delivery Days this run goes out.
4. Optionally pick a Default Driver, the person who usually does this run.
5. Tick the Regions it covers. A region already used by another area shows which area and days, so you can see what's free.
6. Click Add Area.

With a default driver set, delivery orders in this area that have no driver get one automatically: when the order is created, when it's saved, and when its delivery date is moved onto one of the area's days. Saving the area also fills in the driver on its open orders from today on that don't have one yet. A driver already on an order is never replaced, and if you clear the driver on an order and save, it stays cleared.

If one of the regions is already delivered on one of those days by another area, BarSight won't save and tells you exactly where the overlap is, for example: Maple Ridge is already scheduled on Tuesday in Valley. A region can only be in one delivery area per day. Untick that day or that region and save again.

[SCREENSHOT: Add Delivery Area window with the name, Delivery Days checkboxes and Regions checkboxes, one region showing the area it's already used by]

Where You'll See It

On the Order Form

A delivery order shows the customer's Region and the Delivery Area it falls in for its delivery date. If the region isn't delivered that day, you'll see Not delivered on Mondays (or whichever day it is) in red. Hover the help icon to see every day the region is delivered, so you can pick a better date.

When you change the Delivery Date, or switch the order to Delivery, the Delivery Area updates straight away for the new day. If the order has no driver yet and that area has a default driver, the Delivery Driver fills in too. Nothing is saved until you save the order.

On the Deliveries Board

Go to Brewery → Deliveries. The board shows one day at a time; use the arrows or the calendar to move between days. Switch between three views with the buttons at the top of the box:

• Areas (the default): one row per delivery area running that day, with its days, the regions it covers and its default driver. Areas that don't run that day are hidden unless they have orders. Not Scheduled is always last.
• Regions: one row per region, regardless of which run it's on.
• Drivers: one row per driver, plus orders with no driver yet.

Click a row to open its orders. Each row's menu also has Print Pick List, Print Orders, Ship All and Assign Driver, so you can handle a whole run at once.

On today's board, unshipped orders from earlier days are included and highlighted. They stay with the area for the day they were due.

[SCREENSHOT: Deliveries board in Areas view showing Valley and Tricity rows with their days and regions, and the Not Scheduled row at the bottom]

In the BarSight App

Drivers see the delivery area and region on each order card. In All mode, the day's orders are grouped under delivery area headings, with Not Scheduled last.

Tips and Best Practices

• Keep regions about where customers are and delivery areas about when you go there. If a region's day changes, edit the delivery area; you never need to touch the customers.
• Give every customer a region. Customers without one always land in Not Scheduled.
• Before setting a delivery date, check the help icon next to Delivery Area on the order form for the days that customer is delivered.
• Deleting a delivery area keeps its regions and customers. Those regions just aren't scheduled on its days any more.
• Deleting a region unassigns every customer in it and removes it from any delivery areas.

Troubleshooting

Problem: I can't save a delivery area. It says a region is already scheduled.

Solution: That region is already on another area's run that day. Either untick the day, untick the region, or edit the other area first.

Problem: An order shows under Not Scheduled.

Solution: Either the customer has no region, or no delivery area covers their region on that weekday. Give the customer a region, change the order's delivery date to one of the region's days, or add the day to a delivery area.

Problem: An order didn't get the area's default driver.

Solution: The default only fills orders with no driver, on a delivery day of that area. Check the order isn't a pickup, already has a driver, or falls on a day the area doesn't run.

Problem: A delivery area is missing from the board.

Solution: Areas that don't run on the day you're viewing are hidden when they have no orders. Move to one of the area's delivery days.

Problem: The order form says "No delivery area covers this region".

Solution: The customer's region isn't in any delivery area yet. Add it to one in the Delivery Areas box on the Customer Settings page.

Related Features

• The Customer Form Explained: Every Field, Button and Box
• Creating Customer Orders in the Brewery Module
• Import Customers from CSV in Minutes