ServiceTitan Multi-Depot Routing

How ServiceTitan models the start of a technician’s day

ServiceTitan’s dispatch model is per-technician. Each technician has a configured home address and a shop or business unit location, and Dispatch Pro’s “custom start/end location points” setting picks one of those as the start of their day. The optimizer then routes that technician’s scheduled jobs from that start point through their day and back. That’s the granularity. The decision to put a job on tech A versus tech B is informed by skill match, location proximity, sales history and capacity, but the decision to put a job in depot A’s queue versus depot B’s queue is upstream of the optimizer.

In practice, multi-location contractors handle the depot assignment manually. CSRs route incoming calls to whichever business unit covers the customer’s area, jobs land in that business unit’s dispatch board, and Dispatch Pro optimizes within that board’s technician roster. The dispatcher might cross-cover by reassigning a job from one business unit to another, but that reassignment is a manual judgement call.

What multi-depot routing actually solves

The job-to-depot question is the routing problem hiding behind the dispatch board. Some examples where the answer isn’t obvious and the wrong answer costs real time and fuel.

• Regional service contractors. A plumbing or HVAC business with three service centers serving overlapping postcodes. Whose tech goes? Depot 1’s tech is closer to the customer; depot 2’s tech has the right skill; depot 3 has spare capacity today.
• Multi-branch trade groups. A regional roll-up with branches under different brand names but a shared technician pool. Cross-branch assignment is allowed; the optimizer needs to model it.
• Franchise networks. Shared technicians across franchise boundaries with revenue-share rules. Routing decisions need to respect both proximity and the commercial allocation.
• Commercial PM programs across a region. Quarterly chiller PMs distributed across multiple sites, multiple depots, multiple technician home bases. Even slightly suboptimal depot assignment compounds across the program.
• Emergency callouts at the edge of a region. A 9pm callout 90 minutes from depot A and 70 minutes from depot B. The right answer depends on who’s on call, what they’re skilled in, what’s in their van.

None of these are optimized by Dispatch Pro as cross-depot routing decisions. They’re handled by dispatcher judgement or by per-business-unit silos.

The workaround in ServiceTitan and where it breaks

The standard ServiceTitan workaround is to model each depot as a business unit, route incoming CSR calls to the right business unit based on customer location, and let Dispatch Pro optimize within each business unit’s technician roster. Dispatchers can manually reassign jobs between business units. ServiceTitan’s Adjustable Capacity Planning per business unit prevents one business unit from overbooking its capacity.

For a contractor with two well-separated depots and clean territorial boundaries the workaround holds. For a contractor with overlapping territories, shared technicians, or where the right depot for a given job genuinely depends on multiple factors the optimizer doesn’t see, the workaround leaks. The leak shows up as longer drive times than necessary, capacity imbalance across depots (one tied up, one idle), and a meaningful slice of dispatcher time spent making depot-assignment calls that an optimizer should make.

How eLogii handles multi-depot routing

eLogii treats depots as first-class objects, not as a per-technician property. A single optimization run can route across multiple depots, branches or home start locations, balancing depot capacity, technician skills, customer location and SLA windows together.

• Depot capacities. Each depot can hold its own capacity (technician roster, daily job ceiling, opening hours). The optimizer respects depot capacity as a constraint, not just per-technician capacity.
• Cross-depot assignment. A job can be picked up by a technician from a different depot if that produces a better overall plan. Rules let the planner cap cross-depot flow or weight a preference toward home-depot assignment.
• Multi-region planning. A single optimization run can hold multiple regions across countries with their own depots, currencies, time zones and SLA rules.
• Depot returns. Drivers can return to a different depot than they started from if the rules allow it, with the next day’s plan picking up from where the technician actually ended.
• Operator-visible rules. Planners see the cross-depot rules and can adjust them: “only cross-depot for emergency callouts”, “depot A and B share freely, depot C stays internal”, “weight home-depot assignment 1.5x in the objective”.

How the integration sits with ServiceTitan

ServiceTitan business units stay as the system of record for invoicing and customer association. eLogii holds the multi-depot routing model and writes routes back per technician.

1. Read. Jobs, customer records, technicians, business units, locations and skills sync from ServiceTitan’s V2 REST API. ServiceTitan business units map to eLogii depots; cross-depot rules are configured in eLogii.
2. Optimize. eLogii runs the multi-depot optimization, balancing depot capacity, drive time, skills and SLA windows. Cross-depot reassignment happens inside the optimization, not as a manual override.
3. Write back. Routes and ETAs are written back to ServiceTitan as appointments against the right technicians, possibly in a different business unit than the job was originally booked into. ServiceTitan retains the customer relationship; the routing decision sits in eLogii.
4. Technician experience unchanged. Each technician opens the field app they already use, sees their day starting from their configured depot. Completion writes back to ServiceTitan for invoicing.

Most teams complete the integration in 3 to 5 weeks. Common first wave: the multi-branch service operation, the regional PM program or the commercial install team – whichever workflow most needs cross-depot optimization today.

Frequently asked questions

Does ServiceTitan support multi-depot routing?

No, not as an optimization. ServiceTitan’s Dispatch Pro assigns each technician a single start and end location (home or shop) and optimizes per technician. There’s no optimization that balances work across multiple depots, branches or service centers. Regional contractors with multiple physical locations have to assign jobs to depots manually, and Dispatch Pro optimizes within each depot’s technician roster separately.

Can I assign jobs to the closest depot in ServiceTitan?

Manually, yes. ServiceTitan’s dispatch board can show technicians grouped by business unit or location, and dispatchers can assign incoming work to whichever depot makes sense. What Dispatch Pro doesn’t do is optimize that assignment across depots as a routing decision. The closer-depot logic is a dispatcher judgement call, not an optimization output.

What kinds of operations need multi-depot routing?

Regional contractors with two or more service centers; multi-branch HVAC, plumbing or electrical businesses; trade groups with depots in different metro areas; franchise-style operations with shared technicians who can be assigned across regions; commercial service operations whose technicians can start from any of several locations depending on the job. As a contractor grows past one location, multi-depot routing becomes a meaningful share of the planning problem.

How does eLogii add multi-depot routing on top of ServiceTitan?

Through ServiceTitan’s V2 REST API. eLogii reads jobs, customers, technicians and locations from ServiceTitan; eLogii holds the multi-depot model with depot capacities, regional teams and cross-depot assignment rules. The optimization run produces routes that start from the optimal depot per technician, balancing depot load and drive time across the network. Routes and ETAs are written back to ServiceTitan as appointments against the right technicians.

Does Dispatch Pro consider drive time between depots?

Per-technician drive time, yes. Cross-depot drive time as a network optimization decision, no. Each technician’s start point is fixed at their assigned home or shop in ServiceTitan; the optimizer routes that technician’s day from that point. If a job is closer to a different depot’s technician, ServiceTitan doesn’t reassign the job to that other technician as part of the optimization.