Roffes Transport

“It changed how we operate. Where we were previously considering whether we needed more people — we’re not now.”

— Ben Sweetland, Operations Manager, Roffes Transport

About Roffes Transport

Roffes Transport is a family-run haulier operating exclusively curtain-sider trailers across the UK. Having made a deliberate shift away from flatbed work over the last five or six years, the business now focuses on general haulage — with a growing specialism in packaging and paper-based freight, moving everything from raw materials to finished packaging products.

What sets Roffes apart is straightforward: you’ll always get through to someone who knows the business. “If a customer needs to, they’ll ring through to the office and they’ll speak to a Roffe. We’re not just a transport company that offers a 24-hour service but only operates nine to five — we’re a genuine 24/7 operation.”

How they found Qargo

Roffes had been on their previous TMS for less than two years when they started looking for something more suitable to their needs. The recommendation came from one of their closest haulage partners. They also looked at another system, but what they saw when they demoed Qargo made the choice clear.

“The ease of use of the planning boards is what sold it to us. Simple drag and drop. Every other system we looked at was a click and allocate, then a click and deallocate. It doesn’t sound like a lot. But when you’re talking about a couple of hundred orders a day, that time soon adds up.”

The challenge

Roffes made the jump from pen and paper to their first TMS in 2023. Initially, the change felt like progress — but it didn’t take long for the limitations to show. The system struggled to keep pace with the realities of a live transport operation. The mobile app was trialled with a couple of drivers, but quickly abandoned as too clunky. Without a working app, communication defaulted back to phone calls, adding friction at every turn.

Planning regularly ran deep into the afternoon — still building jobs and processing changes at three or four o’clock. On the POD side, accounts and customer services spent three days processing the previous week’s delivery notes, which meant invoices couldn’t go out until Wednesday.

Something had to change.

Onboarding

With Qargo, the team had sandbox access from the start. They could explore, make mistakes, and ask questions before a single real order went through the system. When go-live arrived, two members of the Qargo team were on site.

“We had training upfront before go-live. We had the system upfront. We could ask the questions and get the answers before we even went live. And then on the go-live date, when you’re using it in its actual form — that’s when things crop up. And we were able to ask those questions and get answers almost immediately.”

Within a day, they were fully on Qargo. 

“I don’t think it could have gone better, to be honest with you. Our customers didn’t realise we’d changed system — and for us, that’s the biggest thing.”

The solution

The planning board transformed daily operations almost immediately. Where jobs had previously been building up into the mid-afternoon — with changes still rolling in and no clear end in sight — Roffes now finish planning by 11 or 12 o’clock. The rest of the day is spent reacting, adjusting, and handling the occasional reload or late-breaking job.

For Qargo’s driver app, they made a firm decision to put every driver on it from day one — and it worked. Drivers now self-upload their PODs, know their work for the day without calling in, and prefer not to phone the office unless they have to. 

“The app’s brilliant — especially the language selection. We’ve got some drivers where that was an issue before, whereas now it doesn’t matter what their native language is.”

POD processing changed the rhythm of the accounts team, even if they initially took a bit more convincing. The multi-scan feature — where Qargo allocates the majority of documents automatically, leaving staff to resolve only the exceptions — was met with initial scepticism from both accounts and customer services. The results, though, were hard to argue with. 

The three-day POD backlog is gone. Invoices now go out on Tuesday morning.

Integrations

Roffes connects Qargo with their fleet management system and Xero for accounting. 

They’ve also set up customer order imports, removing a significant chunk of manual data entry for their most frequent clients.

The results

✅ ~30 hours saved per week on planning — the team now finish by 11–12, down from finishing as late as 3–4pm

✅ 24 hours faster to invoice — POD processing cut from three days to two, moving invoice readiness from late Wednesday to Tuesday morning

✅ All drivers on the app from day one — with self-upload of PODs reducing inbound calls and improving document quality

✅ No additional headcount needed — efficiency gains absorbed business growth without expanding the team

✅ Accounts and customer services time freed up — multi-scan POD processing reduced to exception-handling only

✅ Cost analysis powering fleet investment decisions — Qargo’s figures cross-referenced against Xero, giving confidence to plan a significant fleet expansion

What’s next

Roffes are planning a significant growth phase. By the end of Q4 – going into Q1 2027 – the plan is to add new vehicles and trailers to the fleet.

Qargo is playing a direct role in making those decisions with confidence. “What Qargo has allowed us to do is delve into the financials and see if that’s actually viable. We’re using the cost analysis side to make sure our costings are correct.”

Final thoughts

Roffes actively recommend Qargo to other transport companies. Other hauliers have been in touch, and some have come to see the system in action at Roffes’ own operation.

“We have recommended it to other hauliers, and some have gone on to use it. People come in to see the product, so that we can almost sell it on Qargo’s behalf — because we’re that happy with it.”

The reason, Ben says, comes down to something simple: the product delivered on what was promised.

“The people that sold us the product didn’t make commitments on something that wasn’t there. What was sold to us is what we’ve received.”