Many transport companies in Thailand grow up on Excel, paper, and LINE — and it works, right up until the volume outgrows human memory. This is the real story of building a transport business management system for Marvin Khaolak Travel: how we found the real problem, and what we delivered. If you run a transfer, shuttle, or tour company facing the same pains, this one is for you.
Meet the Client: Marvin Khaolak Travel
Marvin Khaolak Travel Co., Ltd. provides airport transfer services in Khao Lak – Phang Nga, operating for over 6 years under TAT license No. 32/01752. Most of its customers are B2B — hotels, tour agencies, DMCs, and OTAs sending transfer jobs every single day.
Business was good. Cars ran all day. But the back office was drowning.
The Real Problem Wasn't the Obvious One
Before proposing anything, we spent time with the actual team — because in the travel industry, the problem is often misdiagnosed. Two things we ruled out quickly:
- Not a "can't reply to chats fast enough" problem — most bookings come from structured B2B/OTA channels, not walk-in chat customers
- Not an "escape OTA commissions" problem — B2B/OTA channels are this business's strength, not its enemy
The real problem: work scattered across Excel + paper logs + LINE/email, with no central system
- Bookings split across many files and machines — searching history was painful
- Vehicle and driver schedules hand-written; every change meant rewriting, every rewrite risked a missed job
- Agency jobs arriving via LINE and email, each one manually copied into spreadsheets
- Route and agency rates living in people's heads
- Monthly revenue, cost, and invoicing summaries taking days to compile
What We Delivered: Odoo 19 at the Core
We designed the system in three parts, with Odoo 19 as the central back office that every channel flows into:
1. The Odoo 19 Back Office — the Heart of the System
- Booking Management — bookings from every channel (website, Agent Portal, OTA, LINE/email) in one system, one status, instantly searchable
- Dispatch — assign vehicles and drivers from a single screen, see the whole day's queue, hand out jobs in a few clicks; drivers get complete job info: time, pickup point, flight number
- Rate Management — rates per route, vehicle type, and agency managed in one place; every channel quotes the same price
- Accounting, Invoicing & Reports — automatic monthly agency invoicing, with real-time revenue, cost, and per-trip profit
2. The B2C Website (Next.js)
marvinkhaolaktravel.com lets travelers book direct:
- Online booking with route, vehicle, and time selection
- Pay by Stripe or cash to the driver
- Instant automatic confirmation — no waiting for an admin
- Flight tracking — if a flight is delayed, the system knows, and so does the driver
- Self-service booking status checks
- SEO-first site structure with a content blog
3. The Agent Portal — a Door for B2B
portal.marvinkhaolaktravel.com is a dedicated space for hotels, agencies, and DMCs:
- Book jobs 24/7 without waiting for a LINE reply
- See their own rates and manage their own bookings
- Every booking lands in Odoo instantly — no manual copying, nothing falls through
The Most Life-Changing Part Wasn't the Website
It sounds counterintuitive — the polished website and the Agent Portal are the most visible deliverables. But the part that truly changed how the whole company works is the Odoo back office.
Because this business never had a "can't sell" problem. It had a "back office can't keep up" problem. Once every channel flowed into one system:
- The team stopped being human copy-paste machines and got back to service work
- "Who's taking this job, which car, what price?" became a 10-second answer
- The owner sees the business through real reports, not gut feeling
That's the big lesson for transport businesses of any size: invest first in the system your staff uses every day, not just the storefront your customers see.
Does Your Business Have These Symptoms?
If your transfer, shuttle, or tour company is:
- Juggling multiple Excel files with no single source of truth
- Scheduling vehicles and drivers on paper or a whiteboard
- Receiving jobs from several channels and copying them by hand
- Closing monthly books late because data lives everywhere
Those are the signs you need a real transport business management system — and you don't have to start big. Start with the core that hurts most, then expand.
Adowbig designs and builds Odoo ERP systems, web applications, and custom software for Thai businesses. See our services or get a free consultation — we always start by listening to the real problem, exactly as we did with Marvin Khaolak Travel.
