What is a transport management system (TMS), and does a dealer group need one?

What is a transport management system?

A transport management system (TMS) is software that plans, dispatches, tracks and costs every movement a business makes, from the request to the proof of delivery.

In freight, that means pallets and trailers. In a dealer group, it means cars: stock moving between sites, vehicles going to and from prep centres, customer deliveries, auction collections and bodyshop runs.

Most groups already do all of this. They just do it across a spreadsheet, a WhatsApp group, a phone and an inbox full of broker quotes. A TMS puts those movements in one place, so you can see what every move costs and plan them as a single operation rather than a string of separate jobs.

What a TMS replaces in a dealer group

In most groups, transport isn't owned by anyone in particular. A sales manager requests a car, someone in admin finds a driver or books a transporter, and the cost lands in a different budget weeks later.

A TMS replaces the pieces that hold that together today:

The last two rows matter most. Without them, transport stays a cost line nobody can explain, so nobody can reduce it.

How a vehicle logistics TMS differs from a freight TMS

Freight TMS platforms are built around loads: how many pallets fit on a trailer, which lane is cheapest, when the truck arrives. Finished vehicle logistics works differently, because the cargo can often drive itself.

That changes what the software has to plan for:

• Driven movements. A large share of dealer movements are a single driver on trade plates, not a transporter. The driver then needs to get to the next job or back to base.

• Trade plates. Plates are limited and shared across sites, so the plan has to know where they are and who has them.

• Driver return trips. Every one-way drive creates a return journey. Pairing those journeys, or carpooling drivers home, is where much of the waste sits.

• Mixed capacity. Most groups use internal drivers, contracted carriers and marketplaces at the same time, which the next section covers.

• Vehicle condition. Damage disputes are common, so collection and delivery photos sit inside the job, not in someone's camera roll.

• Stock value. A car waiting three days for a move is a car not on sale. Speed of movement affects stock turn, not just transport cost.

• [NEW] Site visibility. A dealer site plans prep, handover and customer appointments around when a car arrives, so it needs to know where the car is, not just that it's been booked.

A generic freight TMS can be bent to fit some of this. A vehicle logistics TMS starts from it.

Running your own drivers and trusted providers in one plan

Few dealer groups move cars one way. Most run their own drivers for short, frequent site-to-site runs, keep a handful of trusted transport providers for transporter loads and longer distances, and use a marketplace when they need extra capacity. Some jobs are driven on trade plates. Others go on a transporter.

The hard part is deciding where each movement should go. That depends on:

• distance and deadline

• whether one of your drivers is already nearby, or heading back that way

• whether there are enough cars on the same route to fill a transporter

• what each option actually costs for that move

When those calls are made one job at a time, by whoever picks up the request, they tend to go to the most convenient option rather than the cheapest.

Why this needs a TMS

Each source of capacity usually comes with its own tool: a spreadsheet for internal drivers, email and phone for contracted carriers, a separate login for each marketplace. Nobody sees every movement together, so nobody can compare a driven move against a transported one, or spot that tomorrow's three single-car bookings could have been one load.

A TMS puts every movement, and every way of fulfilling it, in one plan. Planners see own drivers, contracted providers and marketplace jobs side by side, choose driven or transported for each job on cost, and record proof of delivery the same way whoever did the move. Over time, that gives you the data to decide how many drivers to employ and which providers to keep.

Keeping every site informed

In a dealer group, a single movement affects more people than the driver. The receiving site needs to prep the car, sales want to tell the customer when it will arrive, and the sending site needs to know it has gone.

Without a system, those updates happen by phone. Someone rings the driver, waits for a call back, then passes the answer on by message.

A TMS sends those updates automatically. Sites are notified when a car is collected, can see a live ETA while it's on the road, and get confirmation with photos when it arrives. Transport teams take fewer "where's the car?" calls, and cars spend less time sitting unprepped because nobody knew they'd landed.

Why a load board or marketplace isn't a TMS

A load board or marketplace is a source of capacity. You post a job, and a driver or carrier picks it up. Many groups rely on one, and they're useful for exactly that. They're built to match a job with someone to move it. Planning your own drivers, managing contracted providers and deciding whether a job should go out at all sit outside that.

A TMS sits above all of it, so a marketplace becomes one source of capacity inside the plan rather than the plan itself. Movex is a good example - Jigcar integrates with Movex, so groups can manage these jobs alongside internal drivers and other transport providers, and see cost, speed and performance across all of them in one place.

Signs your group has outgrown spreadsheets

A spreadsheet works for a single site moving a handful of cars a week. It starts to cost money once movements cross sites and suppliers. These are the usual signs:

• Nobody can tell you what transport cost the group last month without pulling invoices together.

• Two drivers pass each other on the motorway doing opposite runs, then take the train home.

• Sites book their own transport, so you pay broker rates for routes your own drivers already cover.

• Damage claims turn into arguments because there's no timestamped photo from collection.

• Sales chase cars by phone because nobody can see where a vehicle is in the plan.

• You've added sites through acquisition, and each one brought its own way of moving cars.

If three or more of these sound familiar, the issue usually isn't the people running transport. They're working without a system built for the job.

Not a dealer group?

The same problems show up anywhere cars move between sites. What changes is the shape of the work:

• Transport providers and 3PLs plan drivers and transporters across many customers' jobs, and need proof of delivery that holds up in a damage dispute. Transport providers

• Auction houses move high volumes in and out of site against sale-day deadlines. Vehicle auctions

• Accident repair centres move customer cars and courtesy cars in both directions, often on the same day. Accident repair

• Rental and fleet operators rebalance vehicles between branches to match demand. Rentals

Where Jigcar fits

Jigcar is an AI-powered transport management system for vehicle logistics. It plans, dispatches and costs every movement across internal drivers, contracted carriers and on-demand marketplaces from one system. It is operational software, not a marketplace, so it works with whichever providers a group already uses.

The aim is to turn unnecessary transport cost into margin. In practice that comes from a few parts working together:

• The Optimiser is the planning engine. It pairs movements so one driver covers both legs of a journey, builds loads for transporters and cuts empty mileage. Read how the Optimiser works.

• The Assistants are the chat interface on top. Planners ask questions or request changes in plain English, and the Assistants work with the Optimiser's plan. Meet the Assistants.

• Carpooling groups drivers on trade plates so they travel together, cutting taxi and train costs on return trips. See how carpooling works.

• The Driver App puts each driver's plan on their phone, from first job to proof of delivery. Introducing the Driver App.

Because every movement is recorded, groups can see the cost of moving a specific car, which providers are fastest and which routes keep repeating. If you're working out whether that's worth it for your group, our guide to measuring ROI for vehicle movement software covers the numbers to check.

Book a demo to see your own movements planned in Jigcar.