Prerequisites
In order to update your Connect Settings, you first must have purchased a subscription to Dispatch Connect. Click here to learn more.
Accessing Dispatch Connect Settings
From your Connect Dashboard, you can access the Connect settings by selecting the Connect Settings header at the top of the page.
To create a new user or driver visit this page for additional information.
Review or Update Organization Settings
From your Connect Settings, you can review the Organization information managed by Dispatch. The following information is collected at the start of your subscription:
Organization Name & Address
Vehicle Capacity Unit & Description
The Organization Name and Organization Address are used for billing purposes, and help to align your Connect subscription with your Dispatch marketplace account.
Vehicle Capacity Unit (VCU) is a setting that will impact capacity calculations throughout your Connect product. Upon Subscription initiation, you can choose from the following to set as your VCU: Skids, Square Feet (Sq. Ft.), Boxes, Pounds, Cubes, Orders, Pallets, or Units.
If you have questions about your Organization information or wish to change these settings, please contact us at connectsupport@dispatchit.com. A representative from Dispatch will reach out to you for support.
Setting a Default Pickup Location
See the Address Book Knowledge Base article.
Optimization Settings
Within your Connect Settings are configuration options that make the route optimization algorithms more accurate.
Organization Delivery Hours
The Organization Delivery Hours settings influence several things within the Connect application:
Deliveries will be marked Incomplete and moved to the next day halfway between the end of one day and the start of the next. For example, if your delivery hours are 8AM to 5PM, we will mark deliveries incomplete at 12:30AM.
The route optimization algorithm will not attempt to schedule a stop before the start of the organization delivery hours or after they end
The time window for delivery pickup and drop off will default to the organization delivery hours.
To protect driver privacy, driver locations are shown on the map from the time a route is started to route completion OR one hour past the organization delivery hours, whichever comes first.
Note: even though organization deliveries are set for a specific time zone, users will see delivery time windows in their local time zone.
Vehicle Base Address
The Vehicle Base Address is used as the default starting location for all vehicles when calculating the starting point of a route.
Service Duration
Service time is the amount of time a driver is budgeted to spend at pickup and drop-off locations. These defaults will automatically be set on the New Delivery form, and can be overridden on any individual delivery.
Review Vehicle & User Information
From your Connect Settings, you can review your list of Vehicles and Users associated with your Connect subscription.
Adding a User
Once you have signed up for your Connect Subscription and have admin access, you can create new users in the Connect Settings. See this article for details.
Review or Update Email and SMS Notification Settings
Notification Settings allow you to customize the notifications your customers and others receive via email and SMS. Notification Settings have recently moved from the Connect Settings area to the new platform-wide Notification Settings. To access Notification Settings, click the Settings link in the upper right of your screen and select Notification Settings.
These settings affect email and SMS notifications about deliveries completed with your own vehicles and ones completed using the Dispatch Marketplace.
Your Recipient Facing Organization Name and Contact Phone Number can be updated to reflect the business name and contact information you want your customers to see within delivery notification emails and SMS messages. To update, simply type in the box and select save.
Setting Time Buffers
If you choose to enable showing ETAs to recipients, you also have the ability to configure a time buffer or cushion that determines the precision of ETAs Connect shows customers. This enables you to provide transparency to your customers while also giving the driver some leeway if there is traffic, unexpected delays, or if he/she needs to take a break.
Estimated time or arrival buffer time is configured In the Notification Settings. The buffer time you select will be added after the ETA to create a delivery window. For example, if the ETA is calculated to be 2:30PM and you have configured a buffer time window of 15 minutes, the customer will be shown an arrival time of 2:30-2:45PM. Buffer time is applied to all stops, pickups and drop-offs, and cannot be overridden for individual deliveries.
If you have questions, please contact us at connectsupport@dispatchit.com. A Dispatch team member will reach out to you for support.