Morning check: jobs with no driver or vehicle

What it does

Carson lists every booking from today to the end of tomorrow that is still missing a driver or a vehicle, earliest first. For each one it checks which active drivers and which vehicles in service are free at that time and which vehicles have enough seats, and suggests one of each. You then approve the assignments one by one.

Before you start

• Your drivers and vehicles are set up in Cars & drivers, with the seat count and luggage space filled in on each vehicle.
• Carson asks before it assigns anyone. An Owner can change that for Bookings & assignments in the Assistant's action permissions.

Steps

1. Open Assistant. The Chat tab opens first.
2. Paste this prompt into Message Carson... and press Enter:

Show me every booking from today until the end of tomorrow that has no driver or no vehicle, earliest first, with booking code, pickup time, pickup, dropoff, passengers and luggage. If a booking has more than one job, say so and do not propose an assignment for it. For each other booking, check which of our active drivers and which of our vehicles in service are free at that time with no conflicts, and which of those vehicles have enough seats for the passengers. Suggest one driver and one vehicle for each booking. Do not assign anything yet: list your suggestions and I will approve them one by one.

3. Read the list. Check the suggestions against what you know that Carson does not, such as a driver's preferences or a client who always asks for the same car.
4. Tell Carson which suggestion to apply, for example "Assign the first one". It prepares one card for the driver and one for the vehicle.
5. Select Approve on each card. If the card shows Failed, read the reason after Why it failed: it is either a scheduling conflict or a vehicle too small for the passengers or bags.
6. For bookings with more than one job, open the booking from Bookings and assign each job there.

What you get

• One list of the gaps for today and tomorrow, with the window Carson actually checked.
• Assignments made after your approval, each recorded in the booking's activity.

Tips and gotchas

• Carson assigns a driver and a vehicle to the whole booking. That is why it skips bookings with several jobs.
• Carson checks seats when it suggests a vehicle, not luggage space. The assignment itself refuses a vehicle with too few seats or too little room for the bags.
• The free-or-busy check behind the suggestion and the check made when you approve use different time margins. A suggested driver can still be refused at approval because of a conflict close to the pickup.
• Carson reads the list 25 bookings per page (and 25 drivers and 25 vehicles at a time) and follows the next page until it has them all. The window can be up to 31 days; on a busy day, shorten it to today if you want a quicker read.
• Nothing runs on its own. Start this check yourself every morning.