AssignIQ
in progress
Adam Smith
We’re excited to introduce
AssignIQ
, a new intelligent scheduling and routing tool
designed to streamline visit assignments while considering sitter history, availability, location, workload, blocked sitters, and more
. Instead of manually assigning visits one sitter at a time, AssignIQ evaluates multiple scheduling factors at once
to determine the most efficient assignments and visit sequences
.Developed using
advanced scheduling logic
, AssignIQ creates optimized schedules quickly and efficiently
, balancing sitter workloads and minimizing travel time. You still have full control to review, adjust, and finalize assignments, ensuring flexibility while reducing manual effort. Whether you're assigning a single visit or hundreds across multiple days
, AssignIQ simplifies the process, making scheduling smarter and more efficient.How to Use AssignIQ
- You can setup scheduling preferences for sitters (such as if they provide cat or dog-only care, don’t do overnights, or should never be scheduled) under AssignIQ Behaviorwhen you edit accounts on theStaff > Staff Accountspage.
- Select Visits to Assign– Choose one or more unassigned visits in the scheduler, click theAssignbutton, and then selectAssignIQ. If you don’t want to use AssignIQ for any reason, just select “Direct Assign” (which will be split up into “Groups” or “Individuals” if you use User Groups) to be able to assign manually.
- Review Assignments– AssignIQ will generateoptimized sitter assignments, considering availability, existing schedules, and travel efficiency.
- Make Adjustments– Choose “No” to remove a sitter from a specific visit and then you can choose from the regular sitter list or “Let AssignIQ Select” to re-run that visit through AssignIQ. If you choose “Yes” for a particular visit you have the option to “Set as Primary/Secondary Sitter”. ClickRe-Run AssignIQto generate new assignments based on changes.
- Finalize Assignments– Once you’re satisfied with the schedule, clickFinalize Assignmentsto confirm the selections and notify sitters. Each sitter will receive a single email as if you had assigned the visits to them normally.
- Set Pet Sitter Preferences– Click thePreferencesbutton to open the panel and adjust how much weight AssignIQ gives yourPrimary,Secondary,RecentandNearestsitters on a "None → Max" scale.
- Optimize Routing Only– If you run AssignIQ on visits that are already assigned, you’ll see an option for "Optimize Mode" in the bottom left. Selecting this ensures that sitters remain assigned to their original visits, and AssignIQ will only optimize the visit order for better efficiency. When you then use the "Optimize" button, it will adjust only the routing and sequencing while keeping the same sitters. When you Finalize for Routing Only, sitters will not be notified—only the visit times will be updated to reflect the optimized schedule. This can also be done from Route view, where there is a dedicated "Optimize" button for each sitter.
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Melissa Hall
When I go to Staff, Staff Acounts, I am not seeing where to edit staff scheduling preferences. Please advise. TY
Adam Smith
Melissa Hall: It's AssignIQ Behavior in the Scheduling Preferences section. It's collapsed by default.
Melissa Hall
Is this currently available for all users or is it still in beta mode? I cannot find this feature and am eager to use it.
Adam Smith
Melissa Hall: You can opt in through
Admin > Business Settings > PPC Labs
J
Julie Gonzalez
I am going to attach a photo here and would like to ask for a change in the assignIQ feature. I have two hour time blocks and it’s always trying to schedule services earlier. There are times where clients prefer a certain time within that time block. For example if medication needs to be given at a certain time. It would be nice if assignIQ could take a look at the schedule, see sitters availability and schedule those visits if possible to go back to back instead of assigning an array of sitters to only do one visit each. In this example it’s not even showing Christina as available.
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Adam Smith
Julie Gonzalez: It's looking at the schedule as a whole, and where those sitters are at those times (either their home or if they have other visits). That being said, if you find that it's suggesting obviously non-ideal sitters (in the context of the entire day's schedule, not just the visits being assigned), submit a ticket with the details so we can investigate.
Also note that using the Preferences you can fine tune how it weighs different factors based on what you find most important.
J
Julie Gonzalez
Adam Smith thank you I will submit a ticket. I think AssignIQ has some promise and could ultimately save us so much time when it comes to scheduling, but should look at the whole time frame that client requested and place it accordingly and look to stack visits instead of one offs that cost us more money to perform. It would be nice if there could be some video training on the preferences because I switched the preferences and still had the same result.
Adam Smith
Merged in a post:
Display Manager-Only Sitter Tags when assigning Individual Sitters
H
Heather Jaeger
Could manager-only tags added to a pet sitter profile also display when assigning Individual Sitters? Update: Also on Assign IQ suggestions as well?
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Dana Mulkey
Once again this is a feature that I have no clue about!?
Angela Kearney
This would be great...we usually have notes on every sitter. We have been using the flags but they don't help much if you can't read them real-time when assigning sitters...there is no way for new admin or old sometimes to remember special notes on sitters as they are trying to figure out who to assign to the pet visit. Thanks!
J
Jakob Senneville
Adam Smith
Is there a way for it to stay on a time schedule, like every 15 minutes? So if a visit ends at 10:45, it would schedule it to the nearest 15 mins.
Also, use the nearest address that the sitter is at?
Adam Smith
Jakob Senneville: AssignIQ is designed to group visits together as efficiently as possible. To do that, it does not rely only on the expected visit length that is entered in the system. It also considers the
average amount of time a specific sitter typically takes to complete those particular visits
.It then combines that information with the
travel time calculation
, which is based on the sitter’s current location at that moment
and the distance to the next home. In addition, the system includes a buffer of up to five minutes
.Using a
15-minute buffer
would likely create too many unnecessary gaps in the schedule and would reduce overall efficiency. Since the main goal of AssignIQ is to build the most efficient schedule possible based on the available information, a smaller buffer is the better fit for how the system is intended to work.J
Jakob Senneville
Adam Smith
Thank you for explaining this. However, that is not how we schedule at the moment. We schedule every 15 mins. Having an 11:05 arrival and not an 11 or 11:15 does not give the correct buffer for our workflow. Maybe we can put one more into the schedule, but it also does not give enough buffer time.
When using the sitter, the current location is great for last min visit. Although some of our sitters travel, using their location is not realistic. Using a visit to visit to visit especially for "bulk" scheduling would be more efficient for us.
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Julie Gonzalez
Adam Smith where would we put this buffer. Is there a setting within PPC that we can change to a smaller buffer to allow more back to back visits to be scheduled without assigning visits to one sitter and then another sitter to a visit that could technically go to the first sitter to make a back to back visit.
Adam Smith
Julie Gonzalez: AssignIQ puts visits at the next 5 minute mark so the largest buffer you should see would be 4 minutes per visit. Jakob was asking for a larger buffer than that. If you prefer a smaller buffer, it already works the way you want.
J
Julie Gonzalez
I have been messing around with this feature and it’s setting all the appointments either right at the beginning of the time block or way after. I am also noticing with AssignIQ behavior for the sitters it’s assigning one of my sitters who strictly does overnights only to drop in visits. Could we add another category to sitters profiles saying overnights ONLY!
Adam Smith
Julie Gonzalez: We're adding a "Overnights ONLY" preference setting next system update.
For the appointment timing, can you submit a ticket with a specific example and what you would expect to see instead?
J
Julie Gonzalez
Adam Smith Yes I will be happy to submit a ticket. Thank you for adding the overnight only option.
J
Julie Gonzalez
Adam Smith could we also add specific zip codes in order to schedule the sitters appropriately? Meaning when assignIQ looks at the available sitters for the day it will take into an account their zip codes. I have territories set up, but would like to know if there’s a way schedule sitters based on how close they are to clients.
Adam Smith
Julie Gonzalez: AssignIQ is zip code agnostic, meaning it keeps track of where sitters are throughout the day (by exact lat/lon, not broad zip code) in order to know how far they would need to drive for each appointment at that moment.
Kaitlyn Argiro
I am noticing that is it not scheduling sitters in a block, rather it is scheduling the team a few different visits that cannot be completed together. is there a way to fix this?
Adam Smith
Kaitlyn Argiro: Can you submit a ticket with a specific example and what you would expect to see instead? That will allow us to test what you're seeing.
Kaitlyn Argiro
Adam Smith yes sorry! I don't know if its a me problem or a software problem so like to ask here first haha
Adam Smith
Kaitlyn Argiro: I'd definitely like to take a look. This is still the early stages of being introduced by a wider userbase and it could be an edge case we haven't accounted for, a preference that we can make part of the settings, or a bug.
J
Julie Gonzalez
Kaitlyn Argiro it’s not a you problem. I am having that same issue.
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Lisa Myers
Is there a way to have it not choose the end of a time bracket? Such as I have 11-1 and there's only one visit for that sitter; it's setting it for closer to 1pm vs 11am
Adam Smith
Lisa Myers: Can you submit a ticket with a specific example and what you would expect to see instead? That will allow us to test what you're seeing.
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