Tours
A
Touris the operational plan for getting work done: an ordered list of stops, driven by one carrier with a driver and vehicle, carrying one or more shipments from pickup to dropoff.
A Tour is the execution side of a job in Orbit. It is an ordered list of Stops, assigned to one Carrier — usually with a specific driver and vehicle — and it carries one or more Shipments that have been planned onto it. Where the Order holds the commercial and billing side of a booking, the Tour holds who drives it, in what vehicle, and in what order the stops are visited.
A Tour is also the only thing a carrier attaches to. To give work to a carrier, you assign it to a tour — never to a shipment or an order. As the tour is driven, the shipments it carries progress on their own.
Key highlights
The plan that gets driven — an ordered list of stops with one carrier, driver and vehicle.
Carries shipments — one or more
Shipments planned onto it.Where the carrier attaches — a carrier is assigned to a
Tour, not to a shipment or order.You review to complete — a finished tour is reviewed and closed in Orbit MissionControl.
Nothing is deleted — cancelling a tour keeps it and frees its shipments to be re-planned.
What a Tour carries
Most shipments are carried straight through, and the whole shipment sits on one tour. Where a shipment is carried in stages, it is the individual stage that sits on the tour rather than the whole shipment. One tour can therefore carry a stage of a journey that continues on a different tour, with a different carrier, on a different day.
From the tour's point of view nothing changes: it is still an ordered list of stops with cargo to collect and drop. See the Legs article for how a journey is divided into stages.
Getting a carrier onto a Tour
A new Tour starts without a carrier. You can assign a carrier to it directly, or offer the work through a Callout on the marketplace and assign the carrier whose bid or acceptance wins. Once a carrier is attached — usually together with a driver and vehicle — the tour is ready to run. Assigning through the marketplace is a dispatch task; see the dispatch and marketplace articles for how offers work.
A Tour is scoped to a Region, so operator lists and dispatch can be filtered by region.
Tour statuses
A Tour moves through its own set of statuses as it is dispatched, driven and closed. You move it along by taking actions — assigning a carrier, the driver running the tour, and reviewing it — rather than by editing a status field.
Status | What it means |
|---|---|
| No carrier yet — the tour still needs dispatching. |
| A carrier (and usually a driver and vehicle) is attached, but the tour has not started. Some views label this |
| The driver has started; the tour is progressing stop by stop. While running, Orbit also shows the driver's position along the route — arrived at or departed from a given stop. |
| The driver has finished the last stop and the tour is awaiting the operator's review. |
| The tour has been reviewed and closed. |
| The tour was called off. It remains readable. |
The same stage can read differently in different views — for example an Assigned tour appears as Upcoming in some places. The underlying stage is the same wherever you see it.
Running and reviewing a Tour
Once assigned, the driver starts the tour and it becomes Running, working through each stop in order. After the last stop, the tour finishes and waits for you to review it. Reviewing a finished tour in Orbit MissionControl is how a tour reaches Completed — it is the step that closes the tour. Review becomes available once the tour has finished its stops.
Driving a Tour is also what advances the shipments it carries. As stops are completed and the tour is reviewed, each shipment moves through its own execution statuses to Delivered. You never mark shipments delivered by hand — you drive the tour, and the shipments follow. A shipment carried in stages reaches Delivered only once every stage has been delivered, so finishing one tour may leave it still in progress. See the Order, Shipment, Tour & Leg Statuses article for how statuses update as you work.
Cancelling a Tour
Cancelling a Tour never deletes it. The tour is marked Cancelled and stays readable, and the work it was carrying detaches and becomes plannable again — ready to be put onto another tour, with its history intact.
Where a shipment was carried in stages, only the stage that was on this tour detaches. The rest of the journey is untouched, so you re-plan that one stage rather than the whole shipment.
Example
A tour leaves a depot in Warsaw with three drops across the city. It starts Not Assigned; an operator offers the work through a Callout, and the carrier that wins is assigned, moving the tour to Assigned. The next morning the driver starts the tour (Running) and works through the stops. After the final drop the tour reaches Review Required; the operator reviews it in Orbit MissionControl and it becomes Completed. In the same step, each Shipment the tour carried reads Delivered.
Frequently asked questions
How do I complete a tour?
Review it once the driver has finished. Reviewing a finished tour is the step that closes it and moves it to Completed.
Can I complete a tour that is still running?
Review becomes available once the tour has finished its stops, so a running tour is closed by letting it finish and then reviewing it.
How do I put a carrier on a tour?
Assign a carrier directly, or offer the work as a Callout and assign the carrier that wins. The carrier attaches to the Tour, not to a shipment or order.
Does cancelling a tour delete it?
No. A cancelled tour stays readable, and the work it carried becomes plannable again so you can put it onto another tour.
I completed the tour, but the shipment is not delivered. Why?
Because that shipment is carried in stages and your tour carried only one of them. It reaches Delivered once every stage has been delivered. See the Legs article.
Why does the same tour show a different status word in different places?
Some views phrase a stage differently — for example Assigned shown as Upcoming. The stage itself is the same.