TowingBossPro Blog — Tow Dispatch

Assigning Tow Calls to a Driver and Truck in One Step

In a lot of tow shops, assigning a call means texting a driver. The truck is assumed: Mike always drives the flatbed, Tony has the wrecker. That works until Mike is out sick and Tony takes the flatbed, or the flatbed is in the shop and Mike is in the spare. Then the office sends a call that needs a flatbed to a driver who is sitting in a wheel-lift, and the customer waits an extra hour while somebody fixes it.

Assigning calls to a driver and truck at the same time removes that guesswork.

Driver and Truck Are Two Different Things

Once the open calls are on the map, as covered in The Waiting List: Seeing Every Incoming Tow Call on a Live Map, the next decision is who takes them. That decision has two halves. The driver matters because of who they are: their experience with recoveries, their shift, whether they know the impound yard procedures. The truck matters because of what it can do: flatbed or wrecker, light-duty or heavy-duty, what it can carry and pull.

When the system only tracks the driver, the office has to keep the truck in its head. When it tracks both, the board tells you the truth about what equipment is out on which call.

How One-Step Assignment Works

In TowingBossPro you select one or more calls, either by circling them on the Waiting List map or picking them from the list, then choose a driver and a truck. That is the whole step. The calls leave the Waiting List, appear on that truck's dispatch board for the day and show up in the driver's app with the pickup, drop-off, vehicle details and notes attached.

There is no separate step to text the driver the address, because the address is already in the app with one-tap navigation. There is no separate step to tell the customer, because the driver taps on-the-way when they head out and the customer gets the text.

Matching the Call to the Equipment

The category on the call is your first filter. Light-Duty Tows, Heavy-Duty Tows, Roadside, Accident & Recovery, Impound & Storage and Transports each tell you something about what truck should go. A lockout does not need a flatbed. A low sports car or an all-wheel-drive vehicle may call for a flatbed instead of a wheel-lift, depending on how your company handles them. A loaded commercial truck needs the heavy wrecker.

The vehicle details on the call fill in the rest. Year, make, model and color tell the dispatcher what is being towed before anyone gets on scene. Train call-takers to get those on every call so the person assigning the work does not have to call the customer back.

Assigning in Batches

On a quiet day you assign one call at a time. On a busy one you assign groups. If three calls sit near each other and all fit a light-duty flatbed, select all three and give them to one truck. If a transport starts near where a driver will drop an impound, give both to that truck so the empty miles shrink.

Batching only works if the dispatcher looks at the map before assigning. It is a few seconds of attention that saves a lot of driving.

Batching also helps the driver. Three calls handed out together show up in the app in route order, so the driver can see the whole run before leaving the yard instead of finding out about the next stop one phone call at a time.

When Things Change Mid-Shift

Assignments are not permanent. A driver gets stuck at a long recovery, a truck throws a code, a customer cancels. When that happens, move the call to a different driver and truck. The call keeps its addresses, vehicle details, notes and photos, so the new driver starts with everything the old one had.

The worst habit in dispatch is reassigning by phone and forgetting to update the system. Then the board says one thing and the trucks are doing another. Make the rule that the system changes first and the phone call, if needed, comes second.

Building the Habit

The first week, one-step assignment will feel like extra clicks compared to firing off a text. By the second week the office will notice how many fewer calls they are taking from drivers asking for addresses and from customers asking for ETAs. That is where the time comes back. The next guide looks at the board those assignments land on: the dispatch board by truck.

For the full picture of how assignment connects the Waiting List to the driver app, see the tow dispatch software page.