Most dispatching products assume the unit is a person. Contracting usually dispatches crews, and that single difference makes a surprising amount of general purpose software awkward. A crew is two or three people who arrive together, so pulling one of them to cover a call does not move one job, it degrades two. The board has to know that before the dispatcher finds out.
The crew is the unit and the crew changes
A board that only knows individuals will let you assign three people to three different places and call it a full day, when in reality the crew that was supposed to be together is now nowhere. Holding the crew as a thing, with today membership, is what lets a dispatcher see the consequence of borrowing somebody before doing it.
Sites are longer than days
Work that runs for a fortnight is not a job on a day, it is an occupancy of people across days, and it has to appear on the day board as unavailability or the office will book over it. This is where most single trade scheduling apps stop being usable for contractors, and it is worth testing in the demo.
Subcontractors are capacity you do not control
A subcontracted crew is on the schedule and not on the payroll, and the board needs to show the commitment without pretending you can move them freely. Confusing the two is how a day gets planned around people who were never told about it.
Travel and start times are paid differently
Whether time spent travelling to a site counts as hours worked depends on the circumstances, and the Department of Labor sets the general position out at 29 CFR Part 785. It is worth knowing which of your patterns fall where, because a schedule that assumes a seven o clock start at the yard and one that assumes it at the site are different payroll costs.
Questions people ask about contractor dispatch software
Can a crew be split for one day?
Yes, and the board should make the consequence visible. The failure mode is splitting a crew without anybody noticing the site it left is now short.
Do subcontractors need a login?
Not necessarily. What matters is that the commitment is on the board and that they receive the job in whatever form they will actually read.
Is this project management?
No. The board holds who is where. Sequencing, procurement and cost control are project problems with their own tools.