Lorries, vans and split loads: what changed on the PlanIt EPOS van board in September 2026

Your fleet, named once

Until September, a van on the board was a name typed in the morning: “Van 1”, “Flatbed”, “Dave”. It worked, and it still does, but a yard with a DAF, two Transits and a flatbed was typing the same four names every day and getting them slightly different each time.

There is now Settings → Lorries & vans. Add each vehicle with its name, type (lorry, van or other), registration and usual driver. On Deliveries & vans, “Add a vehicle for Monday” offers the fleet in a list, prefills the driver, and takes a Load number — so a truck that goes out three times becomes “DAF 18t · Load 1”, “DAF 18t · Load 2” and “DAF 18t · Load 3”, each its own board with its own drops and its own picking lists. Add every vehicle puts the whole fleet on the day in one press and skips any that are already there. Removing a vehicle from Settings keeps its name on every past run.

A yard with no fleet set up sees the old free-text box and a hint to the owner, so nothing has changed for anyone who has not chosen to.

The pile is the day’s pile

The right-hand “To be booked” list used to show every unbooked delivery in the system. Looking at next Saturday, you saw Monday’s jobs too. Now the pile is the jobs wanted on the day you are looking at, with two sections underneath: Overdue — wanted earlier and still not booked — and No date asked for. Jobs wanted on other days are counted, not listed; to move one, change the date on the order and it appears on that day.

The same thinking runs through the diary: an overdue tile opens a list with a Rebook date per row, and moving a delivery to another day emails the customer the new date.

Split into loads

The order that started this was 432 bags with 360 on the yard. The 360 had to go today on a delivery note; the 72 needed their own pick note on a later date, in the diary, without pretending the 360 had been delivered first.

On the order card, Split into loads opens with Load 1 and Load 2 and a + Add a load button up to twelve. Each load gets its own date and slot. Against each line you type how much goes on each load; the last load takes whatever is left. Press Split into 3 loads and each load becomes a sales order of its own — its own number, its own place in that day’s pile, its own picking list, delivery note, hand-over and invoice — with a strip on every card reading “Other loads of this order” so nobody loses the family.

• Stock that was reserved for the order stays reserved; the reservation follows the goods to whichever load they are on, so nothing is double-counted or freed by accident.
• Money is apportioned to the penny across the loads; the deposit stays on the first.
• A line that goes entirely on a later load leaves the first load rather than printing as a £0.00 line on its paperwork.
• Each load is an ordinary order afterwards: edit lines or dates, split it again, deliver part of it.

Part of it, at the door

Splitting is what you do in the office the day before. Part delivery is what happens when the van gets to site and two pallets will not fit through the gate. Press Delivered on the drop, choose Part of it, and tick what went. An invoice is raised for that part, pro rata to the penny; the remainder goes back into To be booked tagged “4 already gone”, and the picking list for the second trip prints only what is left. The final part closes the order, and the two invoices add up to the order exactly.

Full loads and notes for the driver

Two small ones, both from an 18 September video. Mark as full on a load, once it is at weight or volume, stops anyone dropping another ticket on it: the load is tagged FULL, it disappears from the “Book on…” list, and a drag onto it bounces with a message. Open again reverses it. Reordering the drops already on it is still fine.

Under each load’s header there is now + Add a note for the driver: do the drops in this order, brake test after the last one, ring ahead for the crane. It saves when you click away and prints in a box at the top of the run sheet as “Notes for this load”.

What the driver should actually collect

The board’s money column used to show the order balance. For a trade account that meant a driver arriving on site with a sheet reading £898.99 against a job the customer would be invoiced for at month-end. The column is now Payment and says one of three things: Paid, On account — invoiced, or £x to collect. The load header totals only the money that is really to be collected and counts the account drops separately.

The run sheet spells it out per drop: “ON ACCOUNT — nothing to collect, it goes on their invoice; get a signature”, “Paid in full — nothing to collect”, or “Collect £x — must be paid before the goods are left” only where the order is actually gated.

Cash pays before the goods go

A walk-in ordering a bulk bag for delivery should pay at the counter, and the delivery charge should be on the ticket before the card goes in — not added afterwards so the order shows £18 owing that nobody mentioned. That is now how the till works.

• The moment Delivery is chosen, the delivery charge is on the order total and the “paying now” box is prefilled with the full amount for a cash customer. A card payment asks for the auth code and keeps it on the deposit.
• A cash customer cannot place a delivery or collect-later order short of the total. If a line is added to a paid order later, the order card shows “£x to pay before this goes anywhere” with a Take £x now button, and the picking list, delivery note and van slot stay disabled until it is paid. Trade accounts are untouched — their money is on terms.
• An order with money on it prints an Order receipt with the balance due, and after Pay now the till asks “taking it now, or a delivery?” so a delivery cannot be completed as a collection by accident (Settings → At the till switches the question off).
• The till no longer prints a picking list for a delivery order — the van board prints them load by load, which is where the yard picks from. Collection orders still print at the counter.

Supplier collections on the same board

When the yard is fetching goods from the supplier itself, the trip belongs on transport with everything else. On an issued purchase order tick We’re collecting this from the supplier, give it a date, and it appears on Deliveries & vans and in the diary tagged FROM SUPPLIER, with the supplier’s name, phone and address as the stop and the outstanding lines to load. Book it on a vehicle like any drop; the run sheet prints a “SUPPLIER COLLECTION — PO-x: load these goods” block with a space for the supplier’s signature. Booking the goods in on the PO is what completes it.

Returns that need collecting

A return on a delivered order is a collection before it is a credit. Create return on the completed order or its invoice asks where the goods are: Handed back here credits immediately; We collect them books a pick-up on a date, with the address prefilled, and holds the credit as a draft — off the account balance and away from Xero — until the driver presses Collected from the van board. The pick-up sits on the board as a PICK-UP row, prints a Collection note without prices instead of a delivery note, and the run sheet reads “COLLECTION — return CRN-x against INV-y”.

Restocking (with 10/15/20/25% chips) and collection or transport charges come off the credit as their own lines, the money goes back by cash, card, bank or onto the account, and a return that never gets collected can be cancelled with nothing to reverse.

Direct to site, and purchase orders that know their orders

Three things joined the order card for goods you do not hold. Order direct to site raises a purchase order to the supplier with the customer’s site address and contact on it, linked to the sales order; the lines are tagged DIRECT on the picking list as “not picked here”, the order sits at Awaiting stock until the supplier’s delivery is booked in, then goes Ready and takes its goods first. Order stock for this order ticks the short lines and opens a purchase order for them. Link a purchase order attaches an existing PO — and one purchase order can now be linked to several sales orders, with the links shown on both sides.

Smaller changes in the same fortnight

• Picking lists per order. A load’s “Print picking lists” prints one sheet per order; the combined whole-load page is now a Printing setting, off by default.
• Multiple bins. A product can be kept in “A3-12, YARD 2, SHED”; search finds it on any of them, goods-in adds a bin rather than replacing it, and picking lists walk the first.
• Wanted-by date required on a delivery order, so nothing lands in the pile without a day.
• Diary moves email the customer the new date, and the order carries the customer’s phone number for the driver.
• The right-hand list stays put as you scroll a long day’s board.

All of it is on every account already — PlanIt EPOS updates itself when the device is idle. The step-by-step guide to the board is in the Knowledge Base under Planning deliveries and van runs.