We’re always on the lookout for ways to make OnTime save its users time and money. One area in which we thought we could do better was in giving you immediate access to postal codes and zip codes quickly and easily. If you have used PC*Miler, or similar product, in the past you are probably familiar with the quick and easy method of offering quotes to customers by just using two zip codes. The question is, how do you get all those zip codes organized into zones in the first place? OnTime has always allowed you to enter these zones in by hand or import them in bulk from an Excel spreadsheet file, but this didn’t always prove helpful to couriers just starting out as they wouldn’t have such spreadsheets to import from.

In view of that dilemma, we are happy to announce that starting with version 2.3.1002 of OnTime, you can quickly download zones from our web service that is provided free of charge to our customers subscribed to the Standard or higher subscription plans. How does this work?

In OnTime Management Suite, go to the Locations area, and then click on the link labeled Download Zip Codes as shown here:

In the window that appears, you can choose to search for your zip codes by State, City, or Area Code. Then type in the search term and click the Search button. (Note that for state searches, you need to use the two letter state abbreviation.) Once the search is completed, you will see the results in list area.

Here is an example of a search for all zip codes in New York state:

Notice that you can click on the column headers in the list to re-sort the columns. This can allow you to group things in a way easier to understand.

At this point, if you click the OK button all items selected in the list will be imported as zones with the city name being the name of the zone. But what if you only want a few items from the list, not all? Just be sure to select only the ones that you want to bring in. While the example above shows all records selected, the example below shows only a few:

In this case, only the items highlighted in blue will be imported as zones. Remember the shortcut in to select individual items from a list like this is to hold down the control key (CTRL) on the keyboard while you click the items with your mouse.

After you make your selections, click OK and you will see the new zones imported along with a message like this:

Merging Zones

If you import a lot of zip codes in this way, it may be helpful to merge them together into more manageable zones. We’ve made this easier by adding a function for merging zones together. To learn how to use this feature, click here.