Business Central Delivery Slot Booking

How Business Central captures a delivery date today

Business Central gives you several surfaces for capturing a requested delivery date, all of them blind to the operational route plan.

• Sales order date picker. Standard Business Central date input. Customer or CSR picks any date. Business Central stores it, the planner sees it the next morning.
• your e-commerce checkout. Storefront lets the customer pick a delivery date, again as a free choice rather than a route-aware availability calculation.
• Business Central customer self-service portal reschedule. Logged-in customers can request a date change. The request lands as an updated date on the sales order; no operational check.
• CSR workflow. A CSR taking a phone order works from the same date-picker surface. Whatever the customer says, the CSR types in.

None of those query the actual route plan. The first time anyone checks whether the date fits is when the planner runs optimization the next morning.

What goes wrong when slots are not route-aware

Three patterns predictably show up at scale.

• Failed visits. Customer asked for Tuesday. Tuesday’s route is at capacity. Either the planner squeezes the order on (drive time spikes, other SLAs miss) or the order misses the date and the customer takes a failed-visit hit.
• Planner burnout. Every morning the planner spends an hour reconciling impossible dates against the route plan, calling customers to renegotiate. Linear cost in the planner’s time.
• Reschedule call volume. When the customer’s requested date can’t be served, someone has to call to renegotiate. Aggregate cost at scale: significant.

The fix is to never offer a date that doesn’t fit. The slot booking co-pilot is that calculation.

How eLogii’s slot booking co-pilot works

The co-pilot is a route-aware availability service exposed via REST. Given the customer’s delivery address, the order details (weight, cube, special handling), and the requested date range, it returns the set of slots that can be served without breaking optimized routes.

• Live calculation against the plan. The co-pilot looks at the current optimized plan, vehicle capacity, time windows, SLAs and depot coverage, and returns only slots that fit.
• Per-stop precision. Slots are scoped to a window (e.g. 8 to 10 AM) that matches what the route can actually deliver.
• SLA preservation. Customer-confirmed slots are protected from re-optimization downstream. The slot the customer picks is the slot they get.
• Capacity-aware. If the day is full, the co-pilot offers the next achievable day rather than letting the customer book onto a route that can’t fit them.
• REST-callable. Same endpoint serves CSR workflow, storefront checkout, Business Central customer self-service portal reschedule, mobile app and any custom UI.

Where the co-pilot surfaces in a Business Central stack

The co-pilot is a REST endpoint, so it can appear anywhere that captures a delivery date. Three common surfaces in a Business Central stack:

1. CSR workflow. When the CSR is taking an order on the phone, the order-entry surface calls the eLogii slot endpoint and shows the agent a list of real options. The agent offers one of those; customer confirms; the slot writes to the sales order.
2. your e-commerce checkout. Customer picks delivery during checkout. Date picker is replaced with a slot list returned by the eLogii endpoint. Customer never sees a date that can’t be served. Order writes to Business Central with the confirmed slot.
3. Business Central customer self-service portal self-reschedule. Customer logs in, sees their open order, requests a reschedule. eLogii returns the achievable slot list; customer picks; reschedule confirms; new slot writes back to Business Central. Around 70% of reschedule requests handled this way without coordinator involvement.
4. SMS-link reschedule. Day-before SMS to customer with a tracking link. If the customer can’t take the slot, they tap to reschedule onto an achievable alternative directly from the link, no log-in required.

The endpoint is the same. The display surface depends on where you want the customer or CSR to interact.

How the confirmed slot writes back to Business Central

Once a slot is confirmed (CSR, checkout, customer-self-reschedule, SMS link), the chosen window writes to the Business Central sales order via Business Central REST API v2.0. The exact target field is a configuration choice during the integration build, typically against a custom field for the slot window (e.g. custbody_delivery_slot_start, custbody_delivery_slot_end) or against the requested delivery date / time fields.

The planner sees the slot on the order in Business Central. eLogii holds the slot against the optimized plan. The driver picks up the order at the right time. No reconciliation, no day-after surprises, no failed visits because the slot was achievable to begin with.

Frequently asked questions

Does Business Central check whether a requested delivery date is achievable?

No. Business Central’s sales order form captures a requested delivery date through a standard date picker. It does not query a live route plan to check whether that date is achievable against current vehicle capacity, time windows or driver coverage. The mismatch surfaces the next morning when the planner sees an order with a date that doesn’t fit any route. Customers or CSRs are picking dates blind to the operational reality.

What is a slot booking co-pilot?

An availability service that queries the live route plan and returns only delivery slots that can be served without breaking optimized routes. The customer or CSR picks from real options, not from a generic calendar. eLogii’s slot booking co-pilot is the route-aware availability calculation: given the current plan, the vehicles, the depots, the time windows, the SLAs, which slots can actually be offered.

Where can eLogii’s slot booking co-pilot surface in a Business Central stack?

Three common places. The CSR workflow when an agent is taking an order or rescheduling a delivery (CSR calls the eLogii slot API and offers real options). The your e-commerce storefront at checkout (customer picks a route-aware slot before submitting the order). The Business Central customer self-service portal self-service reschedule (existing customer logs in and reschedules onto a slot that already fits). All three surfaces call the same eLogii REST endpoint.

What’s the outcome of route-aware slot booking?

Two measurable effects from customers running this pattern: around 35% fewer failed visits because the slot was achievable to begin with, and around 70% of reschedule requests handled without coordinator involvement because the customer picks from real options rather than calling in. Both translate directly to fewer support tickets and lower miles per delivered stop.

How does the confirmed slot write back to Business Central?

Once the customer or CSR confirms a slot, the chosen window is written to the Business Central sales order via Business Central REST API v2.0: typically against a custom field for the slot window or directly onto the requested delivery date / time fields. The planner sees the slot on the order, eLogii holds the slot against the optimized plan, and the route picks up the order at the right time.