Proof of delivery is four things.
Captured while finishing the job, or not captured at all.
OkPilot is proof of delivery software that captures four things at the door: a photo, a signature or code from the recipient, the time and place taken from the device, and the name of the person who did it. All four are part of closing the stop, so the driver cannot complete the job and leave the proof for later.
Proof that depends on remembering is proof you will not have.
Nobody disputes a delivery on the day. The query arrives three weeks later, from accounts, about a stop the driver cannot possibly recall. By then the only question that matters is whether you captured anything at the time. If proof was a separate step after the job, something the driver was asked to also do, then on the busy days it did not happen, and the busy days are the ones that generate disputes.
There are four things worth having, and each answers a different question. A photo answers what was left and where. A signature or a code answers who took it. The time and place, read from the device rather than typed by anybody, answer whether the van was actually there. The identity of the worker answers who to ask. Three of the four with the fourth missing is usually the one you needed.
Be clear about what this is. Proof of delivery is a record, not a remedy. It does not make a failed delivery succeed, it does not replace a bill of lading on a freight movement, and it will not win you an argument where the goods were genuinely wrong. What it does is end the arguments about whether the stop happened, which is most of them, and it tells you quickly when a driver's practice is drifting.
What happens when you type "Show me the proof"
“Accounts says the 14 Mill Road delivery on the 12th never arrived. Show me the proof.”
Stop closed 11:48 on 12 March, 18 metres from the delivery address, by Marcus Reid. Photo shows four boxes inside a porch. Signed by M. Okafor, drawn on the device. The tracking link was opened by the customer at 11:21 that morning. Send the record to accounts as a PDF?
It tells you when the proof is drifting
Four of today's photos are too dark to show anything. All four are from the same driver, all after 5pm. Worth a word about using the flash.
Nine stops on the east run were closed with a signature but no photo. The rule allows either for business stops. Do you want the photo required there too?
Two stops were closed more than 300 metres from the address. Both are in the same gated estate where the van cannot get past the barrier. Change the geofence for that estate?
Capture is how the job finishes, not a form afterwards
The driver does not choose to collect proof. Completing the stop is what collects it. Tapping complete opens the camera, then the signature pad or the code field, and the stop cannot be closed until what you require is there.
- A photo taken in the app, never chosen from the gallery, so the image is from this stop and this moment.
- Time and GPS position read from the device and attached automatically. Nothing about when or where is typed by a person.
- Signature on glass, or a one-time code read out by the recipient, whichever suits the stop. Codes are better where the goods are valuable.
- Works with no signal. Everything is captured on the phone and uploaded when it reconnects, keeping the original capture time rather than the upload time.
Say what you need proof of
“Residential drops need a photo. Business drops need a printed name and a signature from someone at reception. Anything over about £500 of goods needs a code from the customer. If a stop fails I want a photo and a reason before the driver can leave.”
That is the setup. OkPilot creates:
- Different proof requirements per stop type, enforced before a stop can close
- A code sent to the customer on high-value orders, entered by the driver at the door
- A failed stop that also requires a photo and a reason, so the retry can be planned
- A one-page record per stop, with photo, signature, time, place and worker, sendable as a PDF
Since 2018
In market
2,000,000+ tasks
Handled
48 hours
To full setup
Proof of delivery questions
Is an electronic signature on a phone actually good enough?
For a delivery dispute, yes, and for the same reason a paper squiggle was: it is one piece of evidence among several. The signature on its own is weak. A signature plus a photo plus a device timestamp and location, all captured at once and never editable afterwards, is much harder to argue with than a paper sheet that was signed in a stack back at the depot. For freight that legally needs a bill of lading, this does not replace it.
What stops a driver closing jobs from the depot car park?
The position comes from the device at the moment of capture and is compared with the address. Closures outside the radius you set are flagged rather than blocked, because there are honest reasons: a barrier the van cannot pass, a loading bay round the back, a badly geocoded address. The point is that you see the pattern. One flagged stop is geography; forty from the same person is not.
What happens where there is no signal?
Everything is captured on the phone and queued. The timestamp and location are recorded at capture, not at upload, so a stop made in a basement at 11:40 and synced at 2pm reads 11:40. The driver sees nothing different and does not have to remember to do anything later.
Can we send the proof straight to the customer?
Yes, automatically on completion or on request afterwards, as a link or a PDF with the photo, the signature, the time, the place and the name. Most of the value is that it goes out before anyone asks, which removes the exchange of emails entirely.
See what your proof looks like
Book a demo. Bring a dispute you are arguing about now and we will show you the record OkPilot would have had at the time, and what it would still not have settled.