GoDesta Case Study:
Metro Express

Metro Express was founded in 1988 and today runs a fleet of more than 500 vehicles across Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria, and South Australia. For a long time, keeping tabs on all of them meant whiteboards, spreadsheets, and whoever happened to be on shift that day. Five years after switching to GoDesta, that’s no longer how the business runs. Jobs get booked, tracked, and closed out in one system, and the people answering customer calls can see what’s happening without picking up the phone to chase someone else first.

This TMS case study is a deep dive into what changed for one operator, in the words of the people using it every day.

Metro had used transport software for over 20 years before GoDesta, and it did the basics well enough. But new requirements were usually treated as one-off jobs, paid for by Metro and then rolled out to the rest of the market. Over time, Metro found itself working around the limitations of that platform rather than being supported by it. GoDesta changed that relationship by treating Metro as a genuine partner in shaping the product, with feedback from dispatchers, fleet controllers, and managers feeding directly into how the platform developed.

Dispatch that doesn’t rely on one person

Before GoDesta, good dispatch decisions came down to which fleet controller was on shift, and what they happened to remember about a driver, a vehicle, or a client’s quirks. Customer requirements, driver capabilities, and job priorities often lived in someone’s head rather than in the system. If that person was away sick or on leave, the knowledge went with them, and whoever filled in had to guess or start asking around.

GoDesta put more of that information into the system itself. Booking, allocating, driver messaging, and job notes now happen in one connected place through GoDesta’s fleet management tools, so any dispatcher can pick up a job with the same picture in front of them, not just the one person who’s always handled that client before.

In their words:

• A Client Services Representative says GoDesta is “very easy to use,” and points to allocating and booking jobs as clear strengths.
• A Senior Client Services Representative describes the booking process as “easy and user friendly,” with a dashboard that makes it simple to see what’s required.
• A Client Services Team Leader calls out job search, the dashboards, bookings, fleet admin, and reporting as areas working well, describing GoDesta as “the best dispatch software I’ve ever used.”

Seeing everything that’s happening

Visibility used to mean knowing where a truck was on a map. At Metro, it now means being able to answer the questions that come up all day long: Where’s the driver? Has the job been delivered? Is the paperwork ready? Are the compliance documents current? Can someone answer the customer without making three phone calls first?

Metro’s team points to live tracking, driver locations, and job status as things they check constantly, simply because the answers are right there rather than something they need to go find. It’s not just internal, either. Metro’s customer portal lets clients check bookings, tracking, invoicing, and proof of delivery themselves, rather than waiting on a phone call or an email reply.

In their words:

• A Business Development Manager says customers are happy with the portal, including live tracking, ease of booking, invoicing, and proof of delivery.
• Metro’s New South Wales Business Development Manager mentions seeing driver locations, updates, and ETAs on display, along with visibility over client spend and rate updates.
• A Client Services Representative says having the driver section, allocated jobs, and in-progress jobs all on one page “really helps to do the work efficiently.”
• The Metro Express General Manager notes the compliance dashboards work well, and points to visibility in the compliance screens for both drivers and clients as a real efficiency gain.
• A Business Development Manager says customers are happy with the portal, including live tracking, ease of booking, invoicing, and proof of delivery.

One system instead of five workarounds

Metro used to run its operation across a mix of software, spreadsheets, whiteboards, emails, and paper notes. Every one of those systems held a different piece of the puzzle, which meant duplicated work and information that was hard to track down when someone needed it in a hurry.

GoDesta brought booking, tracking, proof of delivery, pricing, invoicing, and reporting into one platform, so teams no longer need to keep their own separate version of the truth.

In their words:

• Metro’s General Manager says invoicing and driver pay are working well, calling the system “very efficient” for her role.
• The South Australia State Manager appreciates being able to quickly retrieve PODs, photos, or job pricing from old jobs has improved efficiency with client queries, and says that the Client and Subcontractor Adjustment function has “dramatically” improved efficiency compared to the previous platform.
• A Client Services Team Leader says job bookings are “all in one screen,” and points to time savings and improved visibility as real outcomes.
• The New South Wales State Manager calls the booking system “top of the art” and says “having everything in one area makes it feel seamless.”
• An Accounts and Administration Assistant, says having everything in one system has made it easier to find information and manage operational records, cutting down on manual paperwork.

Better service, fewer mistakes

When staff can find what they need quickly, customers notice. Metro’s team can pull up job details, PODs, photos, tracking, and pricing without bouncing between systems or chasing colleagues down the hall to ask what’s going on with a particular job.

In their words:

• The South Australia State Manager again points to POD, photo, and pricing retrieval as a direct win for handling client queries.
• A Client Services Representative says GoDesta has improved efficiency in “looking up and sending PODs to customers,” and lists accuracy in bookings and ease of accessibility as measures of success.
• Another Customer Service Representative calls the change a “significant improvement” in efficiency, with driver communication as a standout area.
• The Senior Client Services Representative says GoDesta is much easier to use than the previous system, and “definitely ensures smooth operations and less mistakes.”
• The NSW Business Development Manager lists time saving, improved visibility, stronger communication, and being able to answer customer questions on one phone call as the outcomes that matter most.
  

What it adds up to

For Metro, the real change wasn’t a newer piece of software. It was that operational information became something people could find and trust, instead of chasing it down every time a question came up.

Since switching to GoDesta, Metro has reduced how much the business relies on any one person’s memory, gained better visibility across jobs and compliance, and cut down on the manual record keeping that used to eat into everyone’s day. Customers get straighter answers, staff spend less time chasing colleagues, and the information that used to live in someone’s head now lives in a system the whole team can trust.

All these were intentional improvements. Metro’s administration team, finance staff, and managers all had a hand in shaping how the platform developed, which is a big part of why it fits the way they work rather than the other way around. It also means the platform hasn’t stood still. As Metro’s operation has grown across four states, GoDesta has kept developing alongside it, rather than leaving Metro to work around a system that stopped evolving the day it went live

That’s the same approach behind every TMS case study GoDesta could tell: build the system around the operation, and keep building as that business grows.

Want to see what this could look like for your fleet? Get in touch with GoDesta to talk through what’s slowing your operation down.

hello@godesta.com | 1300 11 46 33

GoDesta: Growing Transport Faster, Smarter