Track route adherence and deviations
Compare each driver's actual path against the planned route in Upper. Turn on Show Actual Path in Live Tracking to spot detours, delays, and out-of-order stops.
A plan looks clean on the dispatcher screen, but the road has detours, traffic, and closures. Upper records the path each driver actually travels so you can lay it over the planned route and see exactly where the two differ. In Live Tracking, the Show Actual Path overlay draws the driver's real footprint next to the suggested route line, so deviations are easy to spot at a glance.
Default labels in this guide are driver/delivery (for example, Drivers and the driver app). A workspace can be set up to show Technician / Service labels instead — the screens and steps are identical.
Before you start
- The driver must have a dispatched route and be working it from the Upper Route Planner driver app, with location sharing on.
- Open the route in Live Tracking to see the actual-path overlay. ETAs and average speed populate once the route is in progress.
Turn on the actual-path overlay
Open Live Tracking
Go to Track → Live Tracking in the left navigation.
Select the route
Use the route/period dropdown at the top (for example, "May week 1") to choose the route plan you want to follow.
Show the actual path
Click Show Actual Path in the toolbar. Upper draws each driver's traveled path on the map alongside the suggested route line. The button changes to Hide Actual Path while the overlay is on — click it again to turn the overlay off.
The actual path is the driver's footprint, shown separately from the suggested route. When the two lines sit on top of each other, the driver is following the plan. Where they split, the driver took a different route.
Read the per-driver cards alongside the map
The actual-path overlay shows where a driver went. The driver cards on the left of Live Tracking tell you how the route is going. Each card shows:
- Driver name, with stops completed out of total (for example, "Stops 0/12")
- Total time and distance for the route
- A Route Complete percentage and a status pill (such as Not Started)
- ETA and Avg. Speed (average speed reads N/A until the route is in progress)
- A View Details expander that opens an inline stop table
ETAs in Upper are calculated from route data and historical traffic patterns, not a live traffic feed.
Check stop-by-stop progress
Expand View Details on a driver card to open the inline stop table. Use the Edit Column picker to choose which columns appear and in what order — there are up to 17 to choose from, including Status, Estimated Duration, Actual Duration, Estimated Distance, Start Time, End Time, Reason, and Notes.
This is where adherence shows up at the stop level:
- The Status column tells you which stops are done, pending, or had an issue.
- Comparing Estimated Duration with Actual Duration shows where a stop ran long.
- The order in which stops complete shows whether the driver kept to the planned sequence.
Some deviation is normal — traffic, a closed road, a quick reroute. Look for patterns instead of one-offs. A single detour on a route is routine; the same driver consistently leaving the planned path in the same area is worth a closer look.
Troubleshooting
Related
See which stops a driver has completed
Track which stops a driver has finished in Upper from Live Tracking and the Tasks Completed tab, with proof of delivery, timestamps, and notes.
View driver locations on the map
Track your drivers in Upper from the Live Tracking page: the map shows each route's path and numbered stops, with per-driver cards for stops done, ETA, and progress.