Zapier vs Custom AI Automation: Which Fits a UK Business?
Zapier prices by the task, and its own documentation is precise about what counts as one and what does not. Worked through against a custom build’s flat running cost.
AI for Logistics & Haulage Companies
Answer Every Booking and Tracking Call Without Touching What Your Transport Manager Alone Decides
A haulage or logistics operation’s phones carry three kinds of call at once — a new booking, a "where is my delivery" enquiry, and someone chasing a proof of delivery — and all three compete with an ops team that is also running the yard. We build AI phone answering, chat and follow-up for UK logistics companies that handles booking, tracking and POD chasing around the clock, while leaving driver-hours and vehicle compliance exactly where the law puts it: with your named transport manager, not a script.
The Problem
Where a logistics business loses time and customers
Booking and tracking calls compete with running the yard
The person who could take a new booking call is the same person marshalling vehicles, checking drivers in, and fielding a "where is my delivery" call at the same time — so on a busy day, one of the three waits.
"Where is my delivery" enquiries have no self-serve answer
Without live tracking a customer can check themselves, every status enquiry becomes a phone call or email that someone has to look up manually, often against the same system the office already has open.
Proof of delivery chasing eats admin hours every week
A missing or unsigned POD holds up invoicing and creates a dispute risk, and chasing drivers and customers for the paperwork is repetitive work that rarely gets automated even though the data usually already exists in a system.
Driver-hours and vehicle compliance is one person’s personal, non-transferable duty
Under the operator’s licence regime, GOV.UK’s own guidance states the transport manager "is responsible for continuously and effectively managing the transport operations" — covering drivers’ hours rules, tachograph administration and vehicle roadworthiness. That responsibility sits with a named, CPC-qualified individual, not with whichever system happens to hold the data.
What We Build
AI solutions for logistics & haulage companies
AI Phone Answering for Bookings and Tracking
Answers every call whether the yard is busy or it is out of hours, takes a new booking through to confirmation, gives a delivery status update from your live system, and hands anything about driver hours or vehicle compliance straight to your transport manager rather than guessing.
AI Voice Agents pricing and detailsWebsite and WhatsApp Booking & Tracking Chat
Lets a customer book a collection or check a delivery status themselves, answers routine questions from your own documentation, and never quotes a delivery time it cannot verify against your actual tracking data.
AI Chatbot Development pricing and detailsPOD Chasing and Exception Routing
Chases a missing proof of delivery automatically, routes a delayed or exception job to the right person, and can flag record-retention reminders around drivers’ hours and tachograph data — informational prompts only, never a compliance decision the transport manager has not made.
AI Automation pricing and detailsConnected to the TMS or Fleet System You Already Run
Works with the platform you already use — Mandata, Microlise, Paragon or Isotrak among them — reading live booking, tracking and POD data rather than keeping a second record, to whatever interface your platform actually exposes.
AI Integration pricing and detailsOutcomes
What changes for your logistics business
- Every booking and tracking call answered, including when the yard is at its busiest
- Delivery status available to a customer without tying up the office phone
- Proof of delivery chased automatically instead of left for someone to remember
- Driver-hours and compliance decisions left entirely with your qualified transport manager
- Admin time freed from repetitive status calls and paperwork chasing
FAQ
Questions logistics & haulage companies ask us
Can the AI make any decision about driver hours or vehicle compliance?
No. Under the operator’s licence regime, GOV.UK states plainly that the transport manager "is responsible for continuously and effectively managing the transport operations," covering drivers’ hours, tachograph administration and vehicle roadworthiness. The agent can support that work with reminders and record visibility, but it is built never to make or imply a compliance decision — that stays with your named, CPC-qualified transport manager.
Can the AI tell a customer exactly when their delivery will arrive?
Only from what your own tracking system actually reports. It is built never to invent, estimate or round an arrival time it cannot verify, and to say plainly when a status is not yet available rather than guess. If your system does not expose live tracking data, we say so on the discovery call rather than build a feature that would have to make it up.
What is a transport manager, and why does the AI keep deferring to one?
It is the professionally competent, CPC-qualified person named on your operator’s licence, personally responsible for the transport operation’s compliance. That responsibility is specific to a named individual under UK transport law, which is exactly why an automated system should support their oversight with data and reminders rather than ever substitute for it.
Does this help with drivers’ hours or tachograph record-keeping?
It can support it — for example, reminders around record retention or upcoming requirements such as the DVSA’s phased Smart Tachograph Generation 2 fitting deadlines for goods vehicles. What it does not do is decide whether a driver or vehicle is compliant; that judgement stays with your transport manager, working from the actual tachograph and maintenance records.
How is this quoted, and where should a logistics business start?
As a fixed price after a free discovery call, with a one-off build and a monthly fee rather than a day rate. What moves the scope is how many depots you run, whether your TMS or fleet system exposes a live interface, and how much of the booking-to-delivery journey you want automated. Most logistics businesses start with phone answering for bookings and tracking, because it proves itself fastest and needs the least access to go live.
Guides for logistics & haulage companies
AI Integration Cost UK: What Actually Decides the Price in 2026
What drives the cost of adding AI to a system you already run: what the target platform actually exposes, read versus write access, and where legacy software changes the number.
What an AI Automation Agency Costs in the UK, and What You Are Paying For
The tools cost next to nothing. So what is the agency fee for? An honest breakdown of what sits inside it, what actually moves it, and when you should skip the agency entirely.
Before You Get In Touch
What you can hold us to
Plenty of agencies close this part of a page with client logos. We do not publish any, because we will not put a name or a number on this site that we cannot evidence. What follows instead is what you can check in a public register, and what sits in the contract either way.
What the discovery call actually is
Thirty minutes, free, no obligation and no salesperson. You describe what is costing you time or customers, we ask about the systems involved, and you leave with an honest view of whether this is worth doing. We regularly end that call by saying the tool you already pay for covers it.
You own the result
The code, the repository and the accounts are set up in your company name rather than ours, and they are yours on completion and full payment. Nothing runs on infrastructure we control, so ending the relationship does not end the thing we built.
A fixed price, never a day rate
Every project is quoted as a fixed price with a written scope after the call, so an over-run is our problem rather than yours. If the scope changes, we say so and re-quote before doing the work, not after.
Where your data sits
In the UK or EU, under a data processing agreement, kept only as long as you specify. Any model provider we rely on is named as a sub-processor rather than left implicit, and we will tell you plainly where something you have asked for would put a commitment of yours at risk.
What happens when it goes wrong
Agreed before launch rather than negotiated during an incident: what is covered, how quickly we respond, and what counts as new work. Every build has a defined escalation to a person, because the failure that costs you is the one nobody noticed.
Two things you can check
Big Berri Limited is registered in England and Wales, company number 16562429, and registered with the Information Commissioner's Office under reference ZC119995. Both are public registers. Look us up rather than taking our word for it.
See what AI would do for your logistics business
A free 30-minute discovery call. We map where you lose time and customers today, and give you a fixed price for fixing it.
Book a Free Discovery Call