Chapter 4

Trips

A trip is the actual job: a truck and a driver carrying a client’s cargo from one place to another. Trips are under Operations → Trips.

4.1 Creating a trip#

Most trips start from an accepted request:

Open the accepted request and click “Convert to Trip.” The New Trip form opens with the request’s details filled in.
Choose the Truck and the Driver.
Check the Client, Origin, Destination (they must differ), Trip Type, Cargo Description and Weight (tons), and set the Pickup Time if you know it.
Admins also see Trip Value, Currency and Exchange Rate. The value and currency come from the latest quote, and the rate is today’s rate from the currency list (section 11.7). Check them: for any currency other than your base currency, the rate is required. For a Return empty trip they also see the Return Empty Amount, filled in from the quote. When an Operations user creates the trip, the system takes the value and currency from the latest quote by itself.
Click “Create Trip.” The trip gets a number such as TRP-2026-0001 and starts as Assigned. The request becomes Converted. A request is converted only once: if someone else converts it first, for example in another tab, you’re told which trip was made and no second trip is created.

You can also create a trip without a request: Operations → Trips → “New Trip.”

4.2 Moving a trip through its stages#

On the trip page, the button for the next stage moves the trip forward. You can add an optional comment each time, and the system records the time.

From	Button	To	Also recorded
Assigned	“Start Loading”	Loading	—
Loading	“Depart (En Route)”	En Route	Departure time
En Route	“Mark Delivered”	Delivered	Arrival time
Delivered	“Complete Trip”	Completed	Completion time
Delivered	“Start Return Journey”	Returning	Return departure time
Returning	“Complete Trip”	Completed	Return arrival and completion time

When a trip is completed, its truck and driver go back to Available. They stay On Trip while the trip is Delivered, so they can’t be put on another trip until it is completed (or given a return load). Stages can’t be skipped or undone, so check before you click.

A Delivered trip can also take a return load instead of being completed straight away (section 4.9). On a Multi-drop trip, “Mark Delivered” is replaced by marking each stop delivered (section 4.10).

4.3 The trip page#

The trip page shows the truck, driver, route, cargo and the recorded times, the Trip Type and, for a Return empty trip, the Return Empty price, with these tabs:

Overview: the trip details. Admin and Finance also see the Financial Summary: Trip Value, Charges, Total Expenses, Profit / Loss, any pass-through charges with the cost recorded for them, the total To Invoice, and Invoice Status, with a “Create Invoice” link once the trip is delivered, if it hasn’t been invoiced yet. Until then it says “Invoice once delivered.”
Charges: the additional charges billed with the trip (Admin and Finance only). See section 4.8.
Expenses: the expenses logged against the trip (Admin and Finance only).
Timeline: every change of stage, with who made it, when, and any comment.
Assignment History: every change of truck or driver.

4.4 Reassigning a truck or driver#

If a truck breaks down or a driver can’t continue, click “Reassign” on an active trip. Choose the new truck and/or driver, and decide for each whether the one you’re replacing should be “Set back to available.” Untick it if, say, the old truck is going for repair: an unticked truck goes to Maintenance and an unticked driver is set On Leave, so neither is offered for trips. Set them available from the Trucks or Drivers list when they’re ready. Add a note and save. The change is recorded in the Assignment History.

4.5 Logging trip expenses#

Open the trip and go to the Expenses tab.
Click “+ Log Expense.”
Choose the Account the money came from and the expense Category (e.g. Fuel, Toll, Driver Allowance).
Enter the Amount and choose the Currency. Choosing a currency fills in the Exchange Rate to your base currency for the expense date (section 11.7); change it if you paid at a different rate. Add a Description, the date, and attach a photo or scan of the Receipt if you have one: a JPG, PNG or PDF of up to 2 MB. If anything isn’t right, the form stays open, says what to fix and keeps what you typed.
Save. The amount is taken off the account’s balance straight away. Click “View” next to an expense to open its receipt. Receipts open only for Admin and Finance users, and never for clients.

To take an expense off, click “Remove.” The amount goes back into the account, and the reversal shows in the account’s ledger.

4.6 Editing a trip and its value#

Click “Edit” on the trip page to correct its details. Only an Admin sees and changes the trip value, currency and exchange rate. Once the trip has departed (En Route and later), the Audit Log records a change to any of them as a financial override. An edit that leaves them as they were is an ordinary update. Once the trip is on an invoice, nobody can change its client, value, return amount, currency or rate, Admins included: the Edit form greys them out and names the invoice. Cancel the invoice first (or take the trip off a draft). Other details can still be corrected.

The Trip Type can be changed until the truck leaves (En Route). A Return empty trip has a Return Empty Amount, copied from the quote; only an Admin can change it. If the quote kept the rate card price and the rate’s return is a percentage, the return follows the delivered figures like the trip value. Changing a trip to One-way drops its return price. Changing a trip away from Multi-drop removes its stops and its Extra drop charge.

The trip’s Distance starts as the route’s distance (section 6.2). Under Delivery, record what was actually carried once the load arrives: the Delivered Weight (for example from the weighbridge ticket) and, for loads counted in bags or units, the number delivered. Change the Distance if the truck took another road.

If the trip was priced from a rate card per tonne, km, bag or unit, and the quote kept the rate card price, the trip value follows these figures: for example 28.5 delivered tonnes at GHS 120.00 per tonne makes the value GHS 3,420.00, never less than the rate’s minimum charge. The Audit Log records each change as “repriced,” and the trip page shows how the value was worked out. The value stops following the figures if an Admin sets it by hand, if the quote used a different agreed price, or once the trip is on an invoice.

4.7 Cancelling or deleting a trip#

To cancel a trip that hasn’t been completed, click “Cancel Trip” and enter the reason. Its truck and driver go back to Available. A trip billed on an invoice can’t be cancelled: cancel the invoice first (or, if it’s a draft, take the trip off it).
If expenses have been logged against the trip, it can’t be cancelled until an Admin ticks “Override and cancel even if expenses have been logged.” Check the Expenses tab first.
To delete a trip, click “Delete” on the trip page. It shows only when the trip has no logged expenses and has never been on an invoice; otherwise cancel it. Its truck and driver go back to Available, and a request it was made from goes back to Accepted, so it can be converted again.

4.8 Charges on a trip#

Who can do this: Admin and Finance. Operations users don’t see charges.

A trip’s charges are billed on top of its value, in the trip’s currency. When a trip is created from a quoted request, the quote’s charges are copied to the trip’s Charges tab. (If an Admin gives the trip a different currency from the quote, they aren’t copied: add them yourself.)

To add a charge, for example waiting time that came up on the road, open the trip’s Charges tab and click “+ Add Charge.” Pick the charge: the quantity and the amount each fill in from the client’s price (section 6.5). Change them if needed and click “Add Charge.” “Edit” changes a charge’s quantity or amount, and “Remove” takes it off. Every change is recorded in the Audit Log.

Charges can’t be changed once the trip is on an invoice, or after it is cancelled. Add anything else to the invoice as a line instead.

Pass-through charges, such as port fees you pay for the client, have a purple “Pass-through” tag and say “Cost not recorded yet” until you record what you paid. Click “Record cost”: the Expenses tab opens with the amount, currency and a description filled in. Pick the account it was paid from and the category, check the amount (it may differ from what you billed), and save. The expense is linked to the charge, and the charge then shows the cost recorded.

Caution

A pass-through charge and its linked cost are kept out of the trip’s Profit / Loss, so the trip shows only what it earned. Always use “Record cost” for them. If you log the cost with “+ Log Expense” instead, it isn’t linked: it counts as an ordinary expense, and the trip shows a loss of that amount. A charge whose cost is recorded can’t be removed until that expense is removed.

4.9 Adding a return load

A return load is a second job for the truck on its way back. Once the first trip is Delivered, the truck carries another load, often for a different client. The return load is its own trip, with its own client, price and invoice.

Who can do this: Admin and Operations.

Open a Delivered trip and click “Add Return Load.” The button shows only on a Delivered trip, only once for each trip, and not on a trip that is itself a return load.
Choose the Client. The Origin starts as the first trip’s destination and the Destination as its origin; change them if the truck is going somewhere else. Enter the Cargo and the Weight (tons).
Admins also see Trip Value. Leave it blank and the system looks up the rate card for that client, route and truck type (section 6.4). If no rate fits, the value stays at zero. An Admin must then open the trip, click “Edit” and enter the value before it is invoiced. Operations users can’t enter a value, so the rate card prices the return loads they create.
Click “Create Return Load.” The first trip is completed, and its truck and driver move to the new trip, which starts as Assigned. Each trip’s page shows a link to the other.

Invoice each trip to its own client in the usual way (section 8.2).

Caution: Completing the first trip can’t be undone. Check the trip is really Delivered, and that the truck and driver are the ones going back, before you click.

4.10 Multi-drop trips

A multi-drop trip takes one load to several places in a row. Choose Multi-drop as the Trip Type on the request or the trip. On a request, add each drop before the destination under “Drops before the destination”, in the order the truck should visit them; the Destination is the last drop. A Multi-drop request needs at least one drop, and the request page shows the whole route, for example Accra → Kumasi → Tamale. The quote form starts with an Extra drop charge for the drops (section 3.3), and a trip made from the request starts with the same stops. Stops can still be added or removed on the trip, as below.

Who can do this: Admin and Operations.

Adding stops. Open the trip while it is Assigned or Loading. On the Overview tab, under Stops, pick a location and click “Add Stop.” The first stop you add records the trip’s current destination as stop 1, so add the others after it, in the order the truck will visit them. The last stop is the trip’s destination, and the Distance follows it. “Remove” takes a stop off; with one stop left the trip is a normal trip again. Stops are fixed once the truck leaves.

Price. The trip is priced at the rate to the last stop (section 6.4), unless the value was typed by hand or agreed on the quote at a different price. Such a value stays as it is when stops are added or removed, and the message says so: check it still covers the stops. Each stop after the first adds an “Extra drop” charge on the Charges tab (section 4.8): three stops make two extra drops. Its amount comes from the Extra drop charge type (section 6.5), including any special price for the client or group. If the charge type has no amount, the charge starts at zero: set the amount under the charge types, or edit the charge on the trip.

Delivering. Once the trip is En Route, each stop shows a “Delivered” button, with boxes for the Tons and the quantity delivered there. When the last stop is delivered the trip moves to Delivered by itself, and its delivered weight and quantity are the totals of the stops. “Mark Delivered” is not available while a stop is still pending.

Caution: Changing the Trip Type away from Multi-drop removes all the stops and the Extra drop charge.