TowingBossPro Blog — Driver App & Routes

Arrival Texts on the Shoulder: Finding a Stranded Customer Fast

You pull onto the shoulder behind a car with its hazards on. Is it your customer? Maybe. There are two cars with hazards on this stretch, and the customer said they were near the exit. Or you pull into a grocery store lot at 11pm and nobody is standing by a car. They are inside where it is warm, staring at their phone.

The On-the-Way Text: What a Stranded Driver Needs to Hear From the Tow was about letting the customer know you are coming. The arrival text is about making sure they know you are here.

What the Arrival Text Does

The arrival text is a one-tap message from the driver app telling the customer the driver has arrived. It sounds trivial. On a roadside call it does real work: it tells the customer to look for the truck, come out of the store, or flash their lights.

It also gives the office a record that the driver got there. When a customer later says nobody showed up, the call shows the arrival text went out.

On calls where the customer is not around at all, like a shop pickup or a vehicle left in a lot with keys in a drop box, the arrival text still tells the contact the job is underway. It is a small courtesy that commercial customers notice.

Highway Calls

On a highway, the arrival text is part of a safety routine as much as a convenience. Many customers are told to wait away from the vehicle, behind the guardrail or further up the shoulder. The arrival text tells them the truck is there and they can come talk to the driver.

Make sure the driver stops in a safe position before tapping. The text can wait the few seconds it takes to set up the truck and the lights. Rules about scene setup and lighting vary, so check your local requirements and company policy.

Lots, Garages and Stores

In big lots the problem is finding the car. The vehicle details on the call (year, make, model, color, plate) help, and the arrival text brings the customer out to point at it. In a garage with no signal on the lower level, send the arrival text before going down, so the customer knows to meet you.

At shops and dealers, the arrival text to the contact means someone walks out with the keys instead of the driver wandering into the service lane asking around.

The Customer Who Moved

Sometimes the customer is not where the call says. They got a push to the next exit, walked to a gas station, or got a ride and left the keys somewhere. Their reply to the arrival text goes to the office through two-way texting.

Dispatch reads it and updates the driver. That is better than the driver texting back and forth on a personal phone from the cab, and it keeps a record of what the customer said on the customer.

Night Calls

At night the arrival text matters more. Customers waiting alone are understandably wary of any truck that pulls up. A text saying the tow company has arrived, from the same company they called, tells them this is the truck they are expecting.

Pair it with the vehicle details. The driver knows what car to look for, and the customer knows what company to expect.

When It Is Not Enough, and Making It a Habit

Not every customer reads texts. Some have a dying phone, which is often why they are stranded in the first place. The arrival text is a help, not a replacement for the driver getting out and finding the customer. If there is no response, the driver checks the vehicle and calls the office before leaving a scene.

Customers choose which alerts they get, so a small number may have turned off arrival texts. That is fine; the call still runs the same way.

Arrive, park safe, tap arrival. That order, every time, makes the text automatic. Together with the on-the-way text and the customer's live map, it turns the worst part of a breakdown, the waiting, into something the customer can follow. Drivers who build the habit find that customers walk up to the truck instead of the driver walking a lot looking for them.

Arrive, park safe, tap arrival. That order, every time, makes the text automatic. Together with the on-the-way text and the customer's live map, it turns the worst part of a breakdown, the waiting, into something the customer can follow.

See the full set of customer-facing tools on the Tow Truck Driver App page.