Driver Called in Sick? Re-plan Delivery Routes Fast

It is 5:45 in the morning, the trucks are half loaded, and your phone lights up: one of your drivers is sick and won't make it. The stops on that route didn't disappear, the customers are still expecting their goods, and the clock is running.

This guide gives you a calm, repeatable way to re-plan the delivery day when a driver is absent, whether you plan on a whiteboard, in a spreadsheet or with route planning software.

The first 15 minutes: get the facts before you move anything

Resist the urge to start calling drivers straight away. Spend a few minutes getting a clear picture first.

1. Confirm the absence and the time. Is the driver out for the whole day, or just starting late? A two-hour delay calls for a very different plan than a full day off.
2. Pull up the orphaned route. List every stop: customer, delivery window, weight or volume, and anything special (cold goods, cash on delivery, a heavy pallet that needs a tail lift).
3. Check what is already on the truck. If the truck was loaded the night before, the goods are physically committed to that vehicle. That changes your options.
4. Count your real capacity. Which trucks are still going out, how full are they, and how many hours does each driver have left in their shift after their own route?
5. Check who else is available. A spare driver, someone on a day off who likes extra hours, a warehouse colleague with the right licence.

Write this down in one place, so everyone works from the same version of the plan.

Decide what must go today and what can move

Not every stop is equally urgent. Sort the orphaned stops into three groups.

Must go today

• Priority customers: key accounts, customers with penalties in their contract, or anyone who would run out of stock today.
• Tight time windows: a restaurant that only receives before 10:00, a building site that needs material before the crane arrives.
• Perishables: fresh produce, dairy, bakery and chilled goods that won't survive another day in the warehouse.
• Promised orders: anything you explicitly confirmed for today, especially after a previous delay.

Can probably move

• Regular restocking orders where the customer has buffer stock.
• Customers who receive several times a week and can wait until the next visit.
• Non-urgent orders that were scheduled early "because there was room".

Ask the customer

Everything in between. A quick call often shows that tomorrow morning is perfectly fine.

Be honest about the "must go" list. If everything is urgent, nothing is, and you end up overloading the remaining drivers.

Spread the stops over the remaining trucks

Now you redistribute the "must go" stops. This is where most plans break, so check three limits for every truck you add stops to.

• Weight and volume. A van that is 85% full by volume may already be at its payload limit if it carries drinks or building materials. Never add stops on gut feeling alone.
• Shift length and breaks. Adding six stops to a route can easily push a driver past their legal working time. Breaks still have to happen.
• Geography. Give the extra stops to the driver whose route already passes nearby. Splitting a cluster of stops between three drivers usually costs more kilometres than giving it to one.

A practical rule: place the priority and tight-window stops first, then fill the remaining capacity with flexible stops, and move whatever doesn't fit to tomorrow. Don't squeeze in the last two stops "if they hurry". That is how a single absence turns into five late deliveries.

When to rent a van or call in a spare driver

Sometimes the remaining fleet simply can't absorb the load. Consider extra capacity when:

• the "must go" stops would push two or more drivers over their shift,
• the orphaned route has heavy or bulky goods that no other truck can take, or
• a large share of the stops are in an area nobody else covers today.

A rented van with a temporary or spare driver can be cheaper than a day of missed deliveries, lost orders and overtime. The catch is local knowledge: a replacement driver doesn't know where the back entrance is or which café wants the crates by the kitchen door. That is why good customer notes (see below) matter so much.

Tell affected customers early

Customers don't mind a change half as much as they mind a surprise. As soon as you know the new plan:

• Contact moved customers first. Tell them the new day and, ideally, a time window. "Tomorrow between 8 and 9" is far better than "sometime tomorrow".
• Give the stops that stay today a fresh window. If a stop moved from 9:00 to 13:00 because it went to another truck, say so now, not at 12:55.
• Use a short, standard message. Prepare a template so nobody has to write it from scratch at 6 am.

Reload the trucks

If the absent driver's truck was already loaded, you need a reloading plan:

• Unload in reverse delivery order of the new routes, so each driver's goods go on in the right sequence.
• Re-check weight after reloading, especially with mixed loads.
• Keep moved orders clearly labelled and staged for tomorrow, so they don't get shipped twice or forgotten.
• Hand each driver an updated stop list, and double-check that the paperwork or delivery notes match the goods.

Drivers running late during the day

A breakdown, a long wait at a customer or a traffic jam can leave one driver hours behind by noon. The same logic applies on a smaller scale:

• Notice early. A driver who hasn't started on time or is far behind schedule by mid-morning is a warning sign.
• Move the last few stops on that route to a driver who is ahead of schedule and nearby.
• Update the affected customers with a new window straight away.

Prevent the chaos next time

The best re-planning happens before anyone calls in sick.

• Route knowledge must not live in one driver's head. If only Marco knows how to get into the supermarket's loading bay, you have a problem every time Marco is off.
• Keep customer notes with access info: entrance, opening hours, gate codes, where to leave the goods, who signs. Any driver should be able to do any route.
• Write a standard procedure. One page: who decides, which customers are priority, which message template to use, who reloads the trucks.
• Plan holidays and known absences a week or two ahead, so they never become a 6 am surprise.

How BeeRoutes helps on a short-staffed day

In BeeRoutes you mark a driver as absent for the day and re-plan in seconds. The planner spreads the stops over the remaining trucks within weight and volume limits, shifts and breaks, places high-priority orders first and moves what doesn't fit. Orders can be moved to another day, and you can compare plans with fewer or more trucks to decide whether renting a van is worth it. Route optimization respects time windows and receiving hours and accounts for rush-hour traffic in your area.

A replacement driver gets built-in voice navigation and your customer delivery notes in the driver app, so they don't need to know the area. You also get alerts when a driver hasn't started on time, a live map, chat with drivers, and customers receive a one-hour delivery window by email or SMS calculated from the live route.

Plans start from €49/month for 3 trucks (see pricing). Start your free 14-day trial, no card needed, and set up your routes before the next sick call comes in.