The framework for setting rates in DispatchDirect is based on a two dimensional matrix. The first dimension is Vehicle Class - the type of vehicles that your company services, such as motorcycles or medium duty trucks. The second dimension is Service such as towing or fixing flats. These two dimensions should be defined to cover the scope of your business - particularly “Cash” or Call-in“ business. Subsequently, pricing will be defined for the “cells” of the matrix which will become the “Default” pricing for Call-In business, and the starting point to define Account-specific variations

The configuration of Vehicle Classes and Service Offerings is in the menu branch for Pricing Set-Up

Vehicle Class - the type of vehicle being serviced

• Each Vehicle Class must be categorized in a Primary class and a Sub-class
• The Primary class is used to identify trucks that are appropriate to assign to service these vehicles - e.g., Light Duty, Medium Duty, or Heavy Duty
• Each Primary Class must have at least one Sub-class - Standard: which should be used for the most common vehicles serviced in the Primary Class
• A separate Vehicle Class should be configured when the charges are different from other Vehicle Classes
  

Examples of common Vehicle Classes (Primary class - Sub-class) include:

• Light - Standard : most cars and light trucks such as Ford Taurus, Chevy Malibu, VW Jetta, Toyota Camry
• Light - Luxury: premium vehicles such as Cadillac, Lexus, Acura, Mercedes
• Light - Motorcycles
• Light - Specialty: Ferrari, Lamborghini, Porsche
• Medium - Standard: most commercial vans, contractor pick-up trucks, package delivery vehicles
• Medium - Class 4-5: Box trucks, walk-in trucks, beverage delivery trucks
• Heavy - Tractor/trailer: 18 wheelers
• Heavy - Construction: Dump trucks, cement mixers

Service Offering - the different types of services delivered to customers

• Each Service Offering must for be categorized in a Primary Offering and a Sub-offering
• These categories (together with Vehicle Class) are used for organizing standard reporting
• A separate Service Offering should be configured when the charges are different from other Service Offerings

Examples of common Servcie Offerings (Primary Offering - Sub-offering) include:

• On-Scene Service - Standard: Including tire repair, out of gas, jump start
• On-Scene Service - Battery replacement: more expensive than typical service calls - higher labor and the cost of a new battery
• On-Scene Service - Lockout: a simpler, less expensive service offering
• Towing - Standard: Most breakdowns
• Towing - Emergency: Expedited service for accidents, or urgent customer needs
• Towing - Recovery: Overturned vehicles

Getting Started - Suggestions

1. Define vehicle classes and service offerings … keeping it simple to start … its generally most helpful to get up and running quickly, recognizing that DispatchDirect has the flexibility for as much complexity as you are prepared to manage and maintain
2. Begin defining pricing - in Pricing Templates - for the “cells” in the two dimensional matrix - vehicle classes and service offerings - where you do the most business
3. Start by defining Pricing Templates for the “Call-In”/”Cash Call”/“Over-the-transom Calls” – use these as the “default” pricing approach (“List Pricing”) for the business – in so doing any account that does not have a company-specific template for a cell in the matrix will be priced by the system using this default
4. Where a different pricing structure is appropriate for one or more accounts, start with the closest available Pricing template (e.g., for “Cash” business), adjust as necessary, give the template a new name, and “Save as a new template”. Part of the idea behind this approach is to make it easy to create an Account-Specific pricing template by starting with an available template (note: the list of templates – Rates” – can become quite long …. be prudent in creating just what you really need)
5. For the relevant Accounts, associate the new Pricing Template with that account …. The System will use the Vehicle Class and Service offering for pricing – using the Account-specific template when available, and the company default pricing (Call-in/Cash) when account-specific pricing has not been entered