PortaPottyBossPro Blog — Routes & Dispatch

Routing Rental Pickups On Time So Extra Days Bill Right

Pickups are easy to treat as the least important stops on a route. Nothing breaks if a unit sits an extra day at a finished remodel. But pickups carry money in both directions: a late pickup can cost the customer days they did not use, and a forgotten pickup leaves a unit sitting where it earns nothing. The previous article, Keeping Weekly Portable Toilet Service on the Same Day Each Week, covered steady weekly service. This one covers the end of a rental.

How Rental Days Are Tracked

Every rental in PortaPottyBossPro tracks a delivered date, a picked-up date, the days included in the rental, and a per-day rate after that. The lists show a line like Out since 10/3 (12 days, 4 extra), so anyone looking at the job can see how long the unit has been out and how many days are past what was included.

When the unit is picked up, any extra days are added to the invoice automatically as Extra rental days. Nobody has to count days on a calendar.

Why Pickup Timing Matters

Pickup timing is a fairness question. When a customer asks to keep the units longer, extra days are fair, and the automatic line makes sure they get billed. When a customer asked for a pickup on Friday and your truck did not get there until Wednesday, those extra days are your fault, and billing them will cost you the customer.

The fix is simple: route pickups when they are requested, not when the truck happens to be nearby.

Put Pickups on the Waiting List Right Away

When a customer asks for a pickup, whether by phone, text or a request from the customer app, create the pickup job right away. It goes on the Waiting List map like any other stop. That way the dispatcher sees it when building the next routes, instead of hearing about it a week later from a customer asking why the unit is still there.

Where Pickups Go in a Route

Pickups fill a truck instead of emptying it, so they usually go late in the day:

• On a delivery truck, deliver first and pick up on the way back toward the yard.
• On a pump truck towing a trailer, service the route and pick up near the end.
• On a dedicated pickup run, use Furthest First from the yard, so the truck finishes close to home with the units.

Before picking up, the unit should be pumped. Plan whether that happens on the same visit by a pump truck, or in a separate service stop just before the pickup. Mixing Deliveries, Services and Pickups on One Porta Potty Route covers sequencing a mixed day.

Ask for the Pickup Date Up Front

The easiest pickup to route is one you knew about when the units went out. When booking a delivery, ask how long the customer expects to need the units. An event has a clear end date. A remodel or construction job has a rough one. Note it on the job so the dispatcher can see pickups coming a week ahead and plan a route around them, rather than squeezing them in after a surprise call.

For longer jobs, a friendly check-in near the expected end date, by text from the office, often turns up a pickup that the customer had not gotten around to requesting. That frees your unit for its next rental and keeps the customer from paying for days they did not need.

Check Unit Numbers on Pickup

A pickup is where unit numbers pay off. On a site with units from more than one company, or a contractor with units on several sites, the job lists the unit type, quantity and unit numbers, so the driver takes the right units. Photos from the driver app document what was picked up and the condition of the site.

Watch the Out Since Lines

Once a week, scan the lists for units that have been out a long time with lots of extra days. Some are fine: a long construction job the customer knows about. Others are a sign that a pickup request got lost, or that a customer forgot they still have a unit. A quick text from the office through two-way texting clears it up either way.

Monthly Accounts and Pickups

For contractors on Monthly account billing, extra rental days roll onto the one monthly statement with every other job at every site, each line labeled with the site address. That keeps a busy contractor from receiving a separate invoice for every pickup, and keeps the office from chasing them.

Pickups After Events

Event pickups are their own crunch, usually on Monday after a weekend. Plan the Monday pickup route before the weekend, not after. Routing Around Weekend Events: Fitting Porta Potty Deliveries Next to Weekly Service covers event weeks in detail.

For how pickups fit with the rest of routing and dispatch, see PortaPottyBossPro portable toilet route software.