How do I set opening hours, after-hours and public holidays?

What this does

Changes where calls go outside your opening hours, on public holidays and on special days such as a training day or end-of-year closure. You can also treat calls from chosen numbers differently, for example putting a key client straight through or blocking a nuisance caller.

What you’ll need

A Smart Number Manager login (see What is Smart Number Manager and how do I sign in?).
An existing service (see How do I ring a group of phones from one number?, How do I set up a “Press 1 for sales” menu? or How do I send callers to their nearest branch?).
Where calls should go when you’re closed: voicemail, a recorded message, another number or another service.

Steps

Opening hours and after-hours

Open your service from Services.
Set your opening hours (Availability), for example Monday to Friday, 9:00 to 17:00.
Switch on Out of Hours and choose where calls go when you’re closed:

Voicemail (New) or Voicemail (Existing): take a message (see How do I get voicemail, missed-call emails and call recordings?).
Audio Playback: play a recorded message.
Destination: ring another number, such as an after-hours mobile.
Service: hand the call to another service on your account.

Select Save Service.

Public holidays and special dates

Open your service and switch on Date Exceptions.
Choose Custom and add a group for each closure: name it, choose the date or dates, and choose where calls go (voicemail, a message, a number or a service).
Add Australian public holidays as Custom dates. The pre-set holiday list in the portal doesn’t include Australian holidays, so don’t use it.
Select + Add New Group for each extra closure, then Save Service.

Calls from particular numbers

Open your service and switch on Caller Exceptions.
Name a group, enter a caller’s number and select +. Repeat for each number.
Choose what happens to those calls: a different destination, a message, voicemail or another service.
Select Save Service.

Out of hours works on Advanced, Interactive and area routing services. Date and caller exceptions also work on advanced call flows (see How do I build an advanced call flow?).

What you should see

Call your number outside your hours, or on a date you’ve set: the call follows your after-hours or holiday route. A number on your caller exception list follows its own route.

Troubleshooting

After-hours calls still ring the office. Check the opening hours are set and Out of Hours is switched on (green), then save again.
A holiday didn’t apply. Check the date range and year on the custom date, and that it’s saved.
I have a long list of numbers to route differently. Contact us. Large lists can be loaded in bulk.

Done for you

Prefer us to handle this? Contact Bluehubcloud support and we’ll set it up for you.