Moving dispatch off a spreadsheet: what to set up first

October 20, 2026,6 min read

This guide is for a carrier that runs dispatch from a spreadsheet and a group text and is moving onto a transportation management system (TMS). The short answer: set up one driver, one truck and one customer, then put one real load through from booked to delivered before you enter the rest of the fleet. The sections below explain why that order works and what each step involves.

What a TMS replaces from the spreadsheet

A dispatch spreadsheet does three jobs at once, and a TMS splits them apart. The rows become load records, each with its customer, its stops and its legs (one leg per move a truck makes). The group text becomes status updates the driver sends from a phone app. The whiteboard, or the tab you sort by date, becomes the dispatch board, which shows what is unassigned, what is queued and what is moving right now.

Nothing in that list is new work. It is the same information you already keep, stored once instead of typed into three places.

Set up in this order: a driver, a truck, a customer, then a load

Each record needs less than you think on the first day. Fill in the rest when you have a reason to.

One driver. A name and a phone number are enough to dispatch. License, medical card and other compliance dates can wait until the driver list is complete.
One truck. The unit number is what dispatch needs. Registration and inspection dates come later, with the rest of the fleet.
One customer. The company you haul for most often. A load belongs to a customer, so it has to exist before the load does (you can also add one from inside the load form).
One real load. A move you are actually running this week, not a test. Enter the pickup and delivery, mark it Ready, build its leg on the Legs & Dispatch tab, assign the driver and truck, and dispatch it from the Queue on the Dispatch page. Then follow it to delivered, from the driver's phone if they are on the app, or by hand from the office if they are not.

In ActionTMS, the Set up your workspace card on the dashboard lists these steps (with putting a driver on the app between them) after you go live and checks each one off as the record appears, with a 30-second recording of the real screens beside every step.

Before the rest of the fleet

Why one real load comes before the whole fleet

Entering every driver and truck feels like progress, and it is the easy part to finish. But a load is the first thing that uses every record at once: the customer, the driver, the truck and the dates. Running one through from booked to delivered shows you what is missing while the list is still short.

It is also the point where the system starts paying you back. Until a load moves, a TMS is a place you type into. Once one does, it is the place you look instead of calling the driver.

What to bring over from the spreadsheet, and what to leave

Bring what is still moving. Leave what is finished.

Bring your active customers, active drivers, trucks (and chassis or trailers if you run them) and every open load.
Leave closed loads in the spreadsheet. Keep the file read-only as your archive for the history you already invoiced.

In ActionTMS, open container loads can come in by CSV import, one row per container; other loads go in through the load form. Each row's customer must already exist, which is one more reason customers go in early. Drivers, trucks and customers are entered in the app (or, with an AI seat, during the trial or on sample data, by asking the AI assistant). To keep your load numbers continuous with the spreadsheet, the account owner sets the starting number in Settings, Company, Load Numbering: if your last load was 5400, start at 5401.

Run both for one week, then stop the spreadsheet

Pick a cutover day. From that day every new load goes into the TMS only. Loads already in flight can finish in the spreadsheet if moving them mid-run would cause confusion. After one week the old loads have delivered, and the spreadsheet becomes the archive.

The mistake to avoid is keeping both live with no end date. Two places to update means one of them is always wrong, and the team learns to trust neither.

Do not put real records in a sample workspace

A new ActionTMS account starts in a workspace full of sample loads, drivers and customers, so you can click around without risk. Explore there, then go live before you enter anything real: Clear and Go Live removes the whole demo workspace, including anything you created while exploring.

Going live also offers a one-time free 7-day trial of the AI assistant on your own data. Accept it and you can hand it the setup typing ("add these four drivers", or a photo of a rate confirmation) instead of filling in every form yourself.

The first hour, in short

Explore the sample workspace, then go live.
Add one driver, one truck and one customer.
Enter one real load, dispatch it, and follow it to delivered.
Then fill in the rest of the fleet, import your open container loads, and pick the day the spreadsheet stops taking new rows.