What to look for in construction dispatch software

Most contractors start looking for dispatch software when the whiteboard and the spreadsheet stop keeping up: more crews, more jobs, more trucks and more changes than one person can hold in their head.

There is no single right product. The right one depends on your trade, your crews and the problems you are trying to solve.

This guide sets out what to look for, the questions to ask, and how to test a product before you commit. It does not compare vendors.

Start with your own day

Before looking at any product, write down how a day is planned now and where it breaks. This becomes your requirements list and your test script.

• Who builds the plan, when, and from what information?
• What does the plan include: people, crews, machines, company trucks, broker trucks, materials?
• How does the field receive the plan today, and how do they confirm it?
• What changes most often during the day, and how do changes travel?
• What comes back from the field: issues, quantities, hours, photos?
• Where do problems show up: missed assignments, double-bookings, late trucks, late reports?

Rank the problems. A product that solves your top two well is worth more than one that touches ten of them lightly.

The capabilities to check

These are the basics for a heavy civil dispatch tool. Check each one against your own day, not against a feature list.

Planning across every job

• All of the day's assignments in one view: people, crews, equipment, trucks and projects.
• A quick way to reuse a regular crew, so it is not rebuilt from scratch every day.
• A way to spot a person or machine assigned twice before the plan goes out.
• Separate, labelled times for crew start, first load and truck report time.

Publishing and changes

• A clear difference between a draft and a published plan.
• The ability to change a published plan and publish an update, with a record of what changed and when.
• A clear way for affected people to learn about a change. Ask exactly how it reaches them: inside the app, by text message, by email, or by a phone call from the dispatcher.

Trucks and equipment

• Company trucks and hired or broker trucks, with report times and locations.
• Equipment and its availability, including machines that are out of service.
• Trailers and attachments, if they limit what you can move or use.
• Equipment moves between jobs, if you move machines often.

The field side

• Works on the phones your crews already carry.
• Shows each person what they need for their day, and not much else.
• Lets the field confirm an assignment, report an issue and record production.
• Readable outdoors and usable in a hurry, with work gloves on.

Records and visibility

• Daily production and quantities tied to projects.
• A history of past dispatches and changes.
• An overview for managers of what is on site and what needs attention.
• A way to export your data in a format you can use elsewhere.

Questions to ask every vendor

Ask these in writing and keep the answers. A vague answer is still an answer.

Fit

• Which trades and company sizes is the product built for?
• Can you show us a day that looks like ours, in our terms: tonnes, broker trucks, floats?
• Which of our must-haves can you show working today, on a day like ours? Judge the product on what you can use now.

Field use

• How do foremen and crews get access: in a web browser, through an installed app, or both?
• What happens when a phone has a weak signal on site?
• How are changes communicated to the field, and who receives them?
• If the product offers voice or AI entry, what exactly does it create, and how does the office review it before it goes out?
• What does a new foreman need to learn, and how is that training delivered?

Roles and permissions

• Can we control who sees what, by role?
• Can a foreman see only their own crew and project?
• Can we keep office-only information away from field users?

Data and privacy

• Where is our data stored, and who at the vendor can access it?
• Can we export all of our data, and in which formats?
• What happens to our data if we stop using the product?
• How do you protect personal information about our employees and subcontractors?

In Canada, which privacy law applies depends on your province and the kind of information involved. The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada publishes a summary of PIPEDA and when it applies.

Its guidance also says organizations that transfer personal information to a third party for processing remain responsible for safeguarding it, so the vendor's answers matter to you.

Security

• Which security practices can you document, such as encryption, backups and access controls?
• Do you hold any independent security certifications? Ask to see the current report or certificate rather than a logo on a slide.

Onboarding and support

• Who sets up our people, crews, equipment and projects at the start?
• What training do you provide for office users and for field users?
• How do we reach support, and during which hours?

Cost

• How is it priced: per user, per office user, per company or per project?
• Do field users cost the same as office users? This matters if most of your users are in the field.
• What costs extra: setup, training, support, data export?
• What are the contract length and cancellation terms?

Test it with a real day

A demo shows a product at its best. A trial shows whether it fits your work. If you can, run a short pilot with one or two crews before deciding.

1. Pick one real day from last week, with its crews, machines, trucks and at least one change.
2. Have your own dispatcher build it in the product, rather than watching the vendor do it.
3. Make a change mid-morning: a truck breakdown, a weather delay, an operator moved between jobs. Note how long it takes and who finds out.
4. Put it on foremen's phones. Have two or three foremen use it on site, outdoors, for real assignments.
5. Record production at the end of the day, and check what the office sees.
6. Ask the field what they think. If foremen will not use it, the office will not get the benefits either.

Warning signs

• Answers that avoid your actual workflow and drift back to a general feature tour.
• Features described as available that you cannot see working in a demo.
• Broad claims about speed or automation without a clear, step-by-step explanation of what actually happens.
• A field app that looks like the office screen shrunk down, with too many steps for a foreman at the tailgate.
• No clear answer on data export, or on what happens when you leave.
• Pressure to sign before you have tested it.

A simple scorecard

Score each product from 1 to 5 on each line, and weight the lines by how much they matter to you:

• Fits our daily planning: crews, equipment, trucks and projects.
• Handles same-day changes cleanly, with a record.
• Field users can receive, confirm and report from a phone.
• Roles and permissions match how we work.
• Records and history meet the office's needs.
• Data, privacy and security answers are clear and in writing.
• Onboarding and support are defined.
• The total cost is clear.

For the planning habits any tool should support, see how to build a daily construction dispatch schedule and coordinating broker trucks on paving projects.

How STRACTA fits

STRACTA is AI-powered operations software built around the daily dispatch for construction companies across Canada. Each company gets a version of STRACTA shaped to its own crews, roles and workflow.

The office plans and publishes assignments for crews, equipment, company trucks and broker trucks, and publishes an update when the plan changes. Every assignment sits on one board, so the dispatcher sees the whole day before it goes out.

The office can also tell STRACTA what it needs, out loud or in a sentence, and STRACTA creates the assignment, booking, move or task on the board, ready to review and publish. The field works from five tabs on a phone: My Day, Report, Chat, Tasks and More.

Put the same questions to us as to any other vendor, and test it against a real day.