JunkBossPro Blog — Crew App

Automatic On-the-Way Texts From the Junk Crew's Phone

A junk pickup goes faster when the customer is ready. The garage is open, the car is out of the driveway, the dog is inside and the pile is where the customer said it would be. A customer gets ready when they know the truck is coming. That is what the on-the-way text is for.

Texts That Go Out on Their Own

Planning the dump run so the day stays on schedule is covered in Dump Runs Mid-Route: When the Truck Fills Before the Day Is Done. Keeping the customer in the loop while the crew works the route is the other half of staying on time.

In JunkBossPro, on-the-way texts go out automatically as the crew works the route. Nobody on the crew has to stop, open the customer's number and type “on our way.” The driver keeps driving, the helper keeps riding, and the customer gets the heads-up.

Why Crews Should Not Be Texting Customers

In plenty of junk companies, the driver texts each customer from his own phone. It works, sort of, until:

• He forgets on a busy day, and the customer is in the shower when the truck pulls up.
• He texts while driving a loaded box truck.
• The customer saves his personal number and starts calling him directly for every future job.
• He leaves the company, and your customers have his number, not yours.

Automatic texts from the company fix all four. The customer hears from your business every time, the crew keeps their eyes on the road, and replies come back to the office through two-way texting.

Customers Pick Their Alerts

Not every customer wants the same texts. In JunkBossPro, customers choose their alert preferences:

• Night before. A reminder that the pickup is tomorrow.
• When they're next. A heads-up that the crew is headed their way.
• When the crew arrives. A text that the truck is out front.

A customer who will be home all day might only want the night-before reminder. A customer at work who left the garage code might want every one. Letting them choose keeps the texts welcome instead of annoying. A property manager with ten units on the schedule may want none of them, while a homeowner who took a morning off work may want all three.

What the Heads-Up Does for the Crew

The on-the-way text is not just good manners. It saves the crew real time at the curb:

• The garage is open. No standing at the door waiting for someone to find the remote.
• The driveway is clear. The car moves before the truck needs the space.
• The pile is ready. Customers who know the crew is coming often drag the last few bags out to the garage.
• The dog is in. Fewer surprises at the side gate.
• Last-minute changes come early. “Can you also take the old grill?” arrives as a reply before the truck shows up, not as a surprise at the door.

The Live Map in the Customer App

Texts are one way to keep customers informed. The customer app is the other. A customer who opens it on their service day sees today's route on a live map and their place in line, something like “You're stop 12 of 20 — the crew is 5 stops away.” It answers “how long until they get here?” without a phone call. The full homeowner's view is covered in The Customer App From the Homeowner's Side: Live Map, Alerts, Invoices and Payment.

Texts and Your Plan's Allowance

Every plan includes a monthly text allowance: 500 texts on Start, 1,000 on Pro and 2,000 on Crew, counting texts sent and received, in the US and Canada. Pick the plan that fits how many customers you text in a month, counting the automatic alerts and your regular two-way texting with customers. Keeping messages short and plain helps the allowance go further, and it also makes them easier to read on a lock screen.

Fewer “Where Are You?” Calls

The call every office dreads on a busy day is “I took the day off for this, where is the truck?” Automatic on-the-way texts and a live map in the customer app cut those calls down, and the ones that do come in are easier to answer with crew GPS on the office map. To see how customer texts fit with the rest of the crew's tools, visit the JunkBossPro junk removal app page.