TMS Appointments: Dock Scheduling and Check-in

Book a pickup or delivery appointment with a time, location, driver and truck, then work the day’s list: filter by date, expand a row, check the driver in and mark it done.

A dock appointment is a promise about time: a driver will show up at a named location, at a set hour, to pick up or deliver. In Docklify TMS you keep those promises on one page — TMS → Dock Appointments (/tms/appointments) — where each appointment carries its type (pickup or delivery), location, scheduled time, driver and truck, contact, and one of five statuses: Scheduled, Checked in, Completed, Cancelled or No show. This article covers booking an appointment and working it through check-in to done.

Step 1: Create an appointment#

1. On TMS → Dock Appointments, click + New appointment (top right). You land on the new appointment page (/tms/appointments/new).
2. In Appointment info, choose the Type — Pickup or Delivery — then fill in Location and Time; both are required. Address, Driver and Truck are optional but worth filling in now, so the day list is useful later.
3. In the Contact card, add the contact name and phone, plus any Notes the driver or the dock needs to know.
4. Click Create appointment. You return to the list, and the new appointment is there with status Scheduled and its own appointment number.

• Required: Location and Time (the time starts at 09:00 today — change it to the slot you actually agreed). Type defaults to Pickup.
• Optional, but useful on the day: Address, Driver, Truck, contact name and phone, and Notes.

Only location and time are required — everything else can be added as plans firm up. Still, an appointment with driver and truck filled in is far easier to work on the day: the list shows Driver / Truck on every row, so a filled-in appointment can be recognised at a glance when the truck arrives.

Step 2: Work the day’s list#

1. Open TMS → Dock Appointments. The list defaults to today, and the count above the filters tells you how many appointments match.
2. To see another day, change the Date. To narrow the list, type into Search location / driver, or pick a Status, then click Search — the filters only apply when you click it. Reset puts everything back to today with no filters.
3. Read each row: appointment number with its type underneath, scheduled time, location, linked order number (when the appointment is tied to a TMS order), driver / truck, contact and status.
4. Click a row to expand it. The expanded area shows the address and the contact with phone — the details you need when the driver is at the gate.

Step 3: Check in and complete#

1. When the truck arrives, click its row on TMS → Dock Appointments to expand it.
2. Click Check in. The status changes from Scheduled to Checked in.
3. When the pickup or delivery is finished, expand the row again if needed and click Done. The status becomes Completed.

The two buttons live in the expanded row, not in a separate actions column — deliberately, so the list stays a clean schedule you can scan. Only appointments still in Scheduled status show the Check in and Done buttons; once an appointment is completed, the row is read-only history.

• Scheduled — booked, truck not yet checked in. Checked in — the driver has arrived. Completed — the pickup or delivery is done.
• Cancelled — the appointment was called off. No show — the truck never arrived. You will see these statuses in the filter and on rows, so a missed slot stays visible in the day’s history instead of silently disappearing.

Docklify features used in this article#

• Appointment list by day, with date, location/driver search and status filters — TMS → Dock Appointments (/tms/appointments)
• New appointment form (type, location, time, driver, truck, contact, notes) — TMS → Dock Appointments → + New appointment (/tms/appointments/new)
• Check in and Done from the expanded row — TMS → Dock Appointments → click a row
• Linked TMS order number shown on the appointment row — TMS → Dock Appointments