How to Integrate Business Hours in Workflow
Business hours integration enables you to create workflows that adjust based on the current date and time, ensuring customer interactions are relevant and timely.
You can set up automation to check if the current time is during business hours, outside them, or on holidays, and take specific actions accordingly. This helps manage after-hours inquiries, send holiday greetings, and efficiently assign conversations to agents.
How conditions for business hours work
Business hour conditions are evaluated based on the current date and time. These conditions can apply to supported fields like Created or Updated.
The following operators enable you to establish time-based conditions within workflows:
-
Business Hours
Evaluates as true when the current date and time falls within the defined business schedule. This includes both the day of the week and the time range for that day.
Example: If the business hours are set as Monday to Friday, from 09:00AM to 06:00PM, the condition will only be true during that specific time frame.
-
Non-Business Hours
This condition is true when the current date and time are outside the scheduled business hours, including evenings, weekends, or any unconfigured time slots.
Example: If the business hours are set as Monday to Friday, from 09:00AM to 06:00PM, the condition will only be true outside that specific time frame.
-
Holidays
This condition is true for the entire day if the date is marked as a holiday in the business hours schedule.
Example: If
2025-12-25is a holiday, the condition is true all day. -
Before
Evaluates as true when the current UTC date and time is before a specific date-time value.
Example: Before
2025-06-01 03:30:00. -
After
Evaluates as true when the current UTC date and time is after a specific date and time value.
Example: After
2025-06-01 17:30:00.
To configure business hours for chat, navigate to the following path:
Admin > Chat > Work Schedules > Business Hours.
To learn how to set up business hours, click here.
To learn how to set up holidays in business hours, click here.
Note: Supported business hour fields for workflow triggers:
| Workflow Triggers | Business Hour Fields |
|---|---|
| Conversation Created | Created |
| Field Updated, Status Changed, Assignee Updated | Updated |
Where to use business hour conditions in your workflow
Initial Condition in workflow
You can configure the business hours in the Initial Condition added while creating the workflow. The workflow will be executed only if this initial condition is met.
Use case: When you want to run entirely different workflows based on business hours.
Branch via Conditions block
You can add the business hours within a Branch via Conditions block inside the workflow.
Use case: When only a specific part of the workflow should behave differently based on business hours.
Send offline messages outside of business hours using conditional branches
To enable this feature, follow the given steps below:
- Navigate to Admin > Chat > Chat Automation > Workflows.
- Create a new workflow or edit an existing one for the Conversation Created trigger.
- Add or edit a Branch via Conditions block.
- Add or edit a condition branch and add a Created condition.
- Set the operator to Business Hours, choose the appropriate schedule, and save the condition block.
- Add a Send Message block under the default branch of the Business hours and Holidays condition branch to deliver an offline message.
As demonstrated in the image, when a customer initiates a conversation:- During business hours > The workflow asks for their contact details and assigns them to the support team using the round robin method.
- During holidays > The workflow sends the configured message, informing the customer to reach out after the holiday and close the conversation.
- During non-business hours > The workflow sends the configured message, informing the customer that support is currently offline and assigns the conversation to the chatbot.
- After configuring the exit block, Publish and Activate the workflow.
