How to set up delivery zones

What delivery zones do

A delivery zone is an area on the map made up of hexagon cells, with a name, a color, and a list of drivers assigned to it.

Once zones are turned on, route optimization treats them as a preference, not a hard rule: orders that fall inside a zone go to that zone's drivers first, and if those drivers are full or unavailable, other drivers still pick the orders up so nothing is left behind.

When you optimize without picking drivers first (auto mode), the resulting routes are also grouped by zone, and you can use Assign by zone in the driver selection dialog to hand each route to a driver from the matching zone in one click.

Before you start

Zones can only be edited on a computer. On a phone the map is preview-only.

Add your drivers to the team first, so you can assign them while creating a zone.

1. Open the delivery zone settings

Open Settings from the team workspace.

Under About Team, select Delivery Zones.

Turn on the switch in the top-right corner. This is what tells route optimization to use your zones — leave it off and the zones you draw are saved but not applied.

2. Create a zone

In the panel on the left of the map, click New Zone.

Zoom the map to the area you deliver to. The hexagon grid only appears at street-and-suburb level zoom; if you are zoomed too far out or too far in, a hint tells you which way to go.

Select the area, either way:

Click hexagons one by one. Click a selected hexagon again to remove it. Best for fine-tuning boundaries.

Draw it freehand. Click the Pencil button on the right of the map and trace the outline of the area — any shape you like, it does not have to be neat. When you close the shape, everything inside it snaps to hexagons automatically, and hexagons already taken by another zone are skipped. Draw again to add another area to the same zone, or click individual hexagons afterwards to touch up the edges.

Enter a zone name, pick a color (eight presets, or Custom for your own), and choose the drivers who cover this zone. You can search drivers by name or email.

Click Save.

Notes while drawing:

Zones can never overlap. Hexagons already used by another zone show in that zone's color and cannot be clicked. To move an area from one zone to another, remove it from the first zone and save, then add it to the second.

The hexagon size follows the zoom level, so zooming in gives you finer control near boundaries. Use the lock button to freeze the current hexagon size — you can then pan and zoom without the grid changing under you.

Clear all removes everything you have selected in this editing session; Cancel discards the whole edit.

A zone needs both a name and at least one selected hexagon before it can be saved.

3. Manage existing zones

In the list on the left of the map:

Click a zone name to zoom the map to that zone.

Use the Eye icon to hide or show a zone on the map, or the eye at the top of the list to toggle them all.

Use the Pencil icon to edit a zone, and the Trash icon to delete it. Deleting cannot be undone.

Once you have more than three zones, a search box appears at the top of the list.

4. Use zones when dispatching

Optimizing with drivers selected: orders are pushed toward the drivers of the zone they fall in, and fall back to other drivers when needed.

Optimizing without drivers (auto route count): routes come back grouped by zone, labelled with the zone name and color. In the driver selection dialog, Assign by zone fills in a driver from each route's zone; you can still change any assignment by hand before confirming.

Orders that fall outside every zone are grouped separately and assigned like normal.

Troubleshooting

The hexagon grid does not show. You are zoomed too far out or too far in — follow the hint at the top of the map, or lock the grid at a zoom level that works and pan from there.

I cannot click some hexagons. They belong to another zone. Zones cannot overlap.

Optimization ignores my zones. Check that the switch at the top of the Delivery Zones page is on, that the zone has drivers assigned, and that those drivers are part of the task being optimized.

A zone's drivers did not get all of its orders. This is by design — zones are a preference. When a zone's drivers run out of capacity or working hours, the remaining orders go to other drivers instead of being dropped.