A Zone is a grouping of zip codes that is assigned a description and a color. This is utilized in scheduling so that each job you schedule has a color associated with it that represents the Zone or area of your service location where the job is, for better routing of jobs.
The software has a utility designed to make the process of dividing your service area up into Zones a little easier. Go to the Misc/Setup pull-down menu option and choose Zone Creator.
Setting up Your Zones
1. Enter the zip code of your center of business (usually your office's zip code).
2. Enter the radius of your central zone in miles. Remember, the diameter of the center circle will be twice the amount of the radius, so if you want a 10 mile circle for your central zone, you should set the radius to 5.
3. Enter the radius of your near zones outside the central area.
4. Set the number of zones you want in the near circle.
5. Enter the radius of your far zones outside the near area.
6. Set the number of zones you want in the far circle (usually the same as the near).
7. Click the “Set Zones” button at the bottom. This process may take a few moments. You will see the zip codes appear on the circular graph. It does not matter that all city names are unreadable or overlap on this screen, as happens particularly when you service a metropolitan area.
Troubleshooting
If for some reason your cities and postal codes are not loading, then that probably means that your central zone is not in the copy of the US postal code database that we have provided. In step 1, Try a different zip code that is close to your office that may be a larger city or more likely to be in the postal code database.
If it still will not show your area's cities, or if you are outside of the continental US, then you will have to define your zones manually on the Zones list screen (Misc/Setup > Zones), and enter the zip codes that you service on the Cities/Postal Codes list screen (Misc/Setup > Cities/Postal Codes) and assign the zones there.
Refining Your Zones
Of course the boundary areas of your overall service area are not necessarily perfect circles, and so you may need to go to the Cities/Postal codes screen to change the zone for some of your zip codes, or you can also choose Zones from the Misc/Setup pull-down menu to define different zones or change the descriptions of some of the zones created by the Zone Creator.
Setting Zones on Orders that have already been entered
If you are defining your zones now after you have already entered some orders without having them assigned to a zone, then once you have setup your zones like you want them, you can click the Reset Zones on Orders button on the Zone Creator screen and the program will go through all of your orders and set the Zone field according to the zip code on the order.
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