If you work with external transportation companies or subcontractors, and you want to give them access to all information concerning the rounds they take care of, you can do so by creating associated platforms for them.
The advantage of this feature is that your service providers only access information on their tasks, rounds, and real-time tracking. They don’t see any information that doesn’t concern them.
Overview:
- Creating an associated platform
- Task allocation
- Round allocation
1. Creating an associated platform
Please note: this feature requires initial activation by your Customer Success Manager or Customer Support.
On the left side of the screen, you see the associated platform(s) that are already existing, and you have the possibility to add new ones.
Once you chose to add a new associated platform, you will have to enter information on the new platform and the contact information of the representative of that platform, on the right side of the screen. All fields are mandatory.
Then you can filter hubs by selecting the ones your associated platform is allowed to see. The extent to which an associated platform can act on your round and tasks is to be customized by the different toggles available.
You can also switch to one of your associated platforms if your role allows it and if you have the right access. This information can be confirmed by your Customer Success Manager or Support.
2. Task allocation
Once you set up an associated platform, you will, of course, want to define how tasks and rounds will be allocated to the new platform.
The allocation rules are set in Administration > Platform > General > Carrier.
Five options are available:
- The no carrier allocation rules are defined as the name suggests, if chosen, no rules will be applied for the allocation of the carrier. Any carrier can be assigned to tasks belonging to the authorized hubs it belongs to.
- The simple rule-based carrier assignation allows you to define in which field Urbantz should look for the Carrier.
In other words, you announce tasks including a field called “Carrier”, in which Urbantz will find a value that corresponds to the name of an associated platform.
E.g.,: if in that field Urbantz finds the value “lambda” it will allocate the task to the carrier named “lambda”.
- The rule-based carrier assignation allows you to add one condition to the rule you set up.
In the example, you can see below, tasks with the value “Bruxelles” in the field “City” will be allocated to the carrier “Help Center”.
If the value is “Paris”, tasks are not allocated to an associated platform, unless the rule exists.
- The rule based on criteria allows you to define rules with multiple criteria for the carrier assignation. This is why when you select this rule, you can configure several conditions with the use of an operator "and" & "or". You can implement as many rules as needed.
In the example below, you can see that the selected carrier is "Carrier for Urbantz". Tasks will be assigned to this carrier depending on the indicators chosen from the criteria' drop-down menus.
Here, the rule for Carrier for Urbantz's assignation is based on the hubs on one hand and on the days of the week on the other.
Tasks and rounds that have been allocated to associated platforms remain visible on your initial platform.
If you allocate tasks to an associated platform, you can authorize optimizations on that platform.
It will be possible to optimize via the announcement page, via “Round creation” if activated, and in the Round Editor. If the corresponding feature is activated, drivers will also be able to create their own rounds on the associated platform.
To enable optimizations on the associated platform, you can use the toggle “This carrier can create rounds”. To save, click on “create a platform” if it’s a new one or on “edit association” if you want to activate this option on an existing platform.
If you would like to learn more about each criterion, please refer to this article.
3. Round allocation
Once you created your rounds and decided which one you would like to allocate to your service provider, you can go to your Dashboard and click on “Round allocation”.
If rounds are available, you will see their number appear inside the red dot.
When you click on “Round Allocation”, a new page opens, allowing you to allocate rounds to the associated platform by drag and drop.
Once allocated, you will see that the number of rounds to distribute diminished, and the number of rounds on the associated platform increases.
The result of this action is visible below: the round R02 that has been allocated to the associated platform is now visible on that platform (here: Carrier for Urbantzz).
You can adapt the round allocation until the moment the rounds are started.
Note: If you want to switch between the platforms you have access to, you can click on the platform name or logo in the top-left corner. A list of your platforms will appear, allowing you to select the one you would like to work on.