10 Essential Tricks to Shorten Your Next Delivery Routes

As a delivery driver or courier, you want to plan the fastest delivery routes with multiple destinations to increase your wage and get home earlier.

Here are three tips you should know before planning your delivery routes that will save you time while you are out making your drops!

✔ Take your time

✔ Get a decent app

✔ Don’t hang around too long

Delivery routes tip #1: Take your time

Whatever you do, don’t rush. Rushing will have the opposite effect when you get to your drop, so take your time and check you’re getting the correct load on board.

To make extra sure you’re dropping the correct parcels at the right places, take a little bit of extra time at every drop, 10 to 20 seconds, to double-check the right things are in the right place. It’s less haste, more speed thing.

If you rush, you’ll make mistakes that will cost you time, which will cost you money and as we say; time is money! Trust us when we say that this will cut at least half an hour off your day.

Delivery routes tip #2: Get a decent app

There really is no way around it; you can’t do the job without the right tools.

This is why the Circuit app is the best choice for a driver or courier; it will help you find packages in the back of your vehicle and plan the best route for all your deliveries. Not to mention it will save you time on your day!

Delivery routes tip #3: Don’t hang around too long

We’ve all been there; you reach your delivery destination, knock on the door, and no one is there. You keep knocking on the door, you go and try with the neighbours or try to find the magic spot to leave your delivery safely.

Don’t hang around that long – take the delivery back to the yard. Someone else will deliver it the following day. If they are not in on the time they booked, always remember, it is not your fault.

Now that you have these three essential tips on saving time on your day let’s talk about some habits you can adopt as a delivery driver on your first route.

We know it can be challenging to build good habits, but there are a few simple steps from Pete the Courier Driver that you can take that will not only make you a better driver but will help you reduce stress and feel confident in your route every day. The big secret? Less haste and more speed!

Take note!

✔ Get the right load on board

✔ Make sure all of your manifest is there

✔ Know where your packages are in your vehicle

✔ Check your route

✔ Deliver to the correct address

✔ Make sure that you don’t have more than one package

✔ Don’t hang around for too long

Delivery routes habit #1: Get the right load on board

When you get to the depot, make sure that you get the right load on board. Go into the transport office, give them your number, notes, and post or zip codes and tell them where your route is.

It only takes five minutes to check and make sure that everything you’ve been loaded with is what you needed.

Delivery routes habit #2: Make sure all of your manifest is there

If you got a scanning gun, then you’ll know that you have the right load because you have to scan as you go – but it doesn’t always work that way.

Like we said: less haste and more speed! Just take a few minutes to make sure that everything is on board at the beginning of your day. It will save you time in the long run.

Delivery routes habit #3: Know where your packages are in your vehicle

Now, this is where the Circuit app comes very handy to you because it’s got a new feature called Fast Package Finder (Place in Vehicle).

This means that every time you’ve got to load over 40 packages, rather than just throwing them all in the back and thinking “Where is it?”, you can use this app feature that will tell you whether your parcel is in the top, middle, bottom left or right of your vehicle.

That way, when you get to the drop, instead of having to look through a whole van, you can focus on a small part of it and know exactly where to pick up the package.

Delivery Routes habit #4: Check your route

For every delivery, you’ll be given a list of where to go, but here’s a little secret… their route finders are not always the best.

Luckily Circuit can help with this too! The app also does this thing for timed drops. For example, if a parcel has to be there at a particular time, you can put it at that specific time and if a place is shut. It’s a handy tool to avoid you having to wait, for example, for a place to open.

Delivery routes habit #5: Deliver to the right address

You are probably thinking, yes, that’s the whole point, right?

While this is essential and a no brainer, we are all human and sometimes, we make mistakes.

To make sure you deliver to the right address, always check your postcodes addresses. It takes less than 5 minutes to check it on the side and will save you time in the long run.

Delivery routes habit #6: Make sure that you don’t have more than one package

No matter what, you always get that sinking feeling as you get near the end of the run and think more boxes are left than there should be.

It only takes a little bit of time to make sure that everything that needs to be there is dropped before you go to the next one when you get to your drop.

Delivery routes habit #7: Don't hang around too long

It feels good when you’ve managed to get all your deliveries off, but sometimes it’s beyond your control, and you just can’t do it.

It happens. Sometimes all you gotta do is the best you can.

Knock on the door, ring the doorbell, if there are neighbours, then talk to them, or ring the phone number. If there’s a number, but no one answers, stick it in the back of the van and take it back to base. Someone will deliver it tomorrow.

So that’s it.

Shorten your next delivery routes: Conclusion

We know it can be challenging to build the perfect route that ticks all boxes, but we are sure we know that with these practical tips, you’ll be able to take control of your day with a smarter route plan to make your life easier and save you money in the long run.

If you want more practical ideas for making your deliveries faster and more efficient, here’s some handy advice on how to be a faster delivery driver.

Now that you know the ten essential tricks you need to shorten your delivery routes, install Circuit for a free trial now and make delivery easy by saving an hour a day.