If your hours change over Christmas and New Year, your website and Google Business Profile need to say so before customers go looking. Set it all up in the first week of December and you won’t need to touch it again until you’re back.
Online stores have more to do, and sooner. Black Friday sales and Christmas delivery cut-offs both land before the shutdown.
Dates to plan around
| Date | What’s on |
|---|---|
| Friday 27 November | Black Friday |
| Monday 30 November | Cyber Monday |
| Tuesday 22 December | Australia Post’s last Parcel Post date within NSW for Christmas delivery (metro) |
| Wednesday 23 December | Australia Post’s last Express Post date for Christmas delivery within NSW and to most states (metro) |
| Friday 25 December | Christmas Day |
| Saturday 26 December | Boxing Day |
| Monday 28 December | Additional public holiday for Boxing Day in NSW |
| Friday 1 January | New Year’s Day |
| Tuesday 26 January | Australia Day |
Australia Post’s dates are for metro areas. Regional parcels need extra time, so check the Christmas sending dates for your area or ask your local post office. The NSW public holidays are from Fair Work.
Boxing Day falls on a Saturday this year, so NSW gets an extra public holiday on Monday 28 December. It’s an easy one to miss when you’re setting holiday hours.
Holiday hours
On your website
Put your holiday hours everywhere your normal hours appear. That’s usually the contact page and the footer. List each changed day by date, including the days you’re closed:
- Thursday 24 December: 8am to 1pm
- Friday 25 December to Sunday 3 January: closed
- Monday 4 January: back to normal hours
Dates are clearer than “we’re closed over Christmas”. Take the notice down once you’re back, because an old closure notice in February makes the site look abandoned.
On Google Business Profile
Plenty of customers check your hours on Google without ever opening your website. Set them in your Business Profile under special hours:
- Open your Business Profile and select Edit profile, then Hours.
- Next to Special hours, select Edit.
- Pick a suggested holiday date or add your own.
- Enter the hours, or leave it marked Closed.
- Select Save.
Special hours replace your normal hours on those dates only, so you don’t have to change anything back afterwards. Google also asks you to confirm public holiday hours even when they’re the same as usual.
Special hours only cover closures of up to six days in a row. For a longer shutdown, Google says to mark the business as Temporarily closed and reopen it when you’re back. Put a reminder in your calendar for the day you reopen.
Enquiries and bookings over the break
A closure notice
Add a slim banner across the top of every page with the dates you’re closed and the date you’re back. A banner is better than a pop-up. Pop-ups get closed without being read, and they’re awkward for people using a keyboard or screen reader.
Contact forms
Your website will keep taking enquiries while you’re away. Set the form’s automatic reply to say you’re closed and when you’ll respond. If someone is checking messages during the break, make sure the form sends to an inbox they can see.
Match the email out-of-office and the voicemail message to the same dates, so a customer gets the same answer whichever way they contact you.
Online bookings
Block out the closed dates in your booking system, whether that’s HotDoc, Fresha, Calendly or a WordPress booking plugin. The website’s closure notice won’t stop the booking system offering appointments on those days.
After-hours contact
If customers might need you urgently, give them a number to call or tell them where else to go. A plumber might list an on-call number, and a clinic should point to its after-hours service and 000 for emergencies.
Online stores
Sale prices
Set Black Friday prices up in advance with a start and end date. Shopify’s automatic discounts and WooCommerce’s scheduled sale prices both do this, so nobody has to change prices at midnight. Test every discount code before the sale starts.
“Was” prices need to be real. The ACCC’s guidance on two-price advertising says a saving can be misleading if the product was never sold at the higher price, or only sold at it briefly or in small numbers just before the sale. The fine print can’t contradict the headline either. If “30% off storewide” excludes half the range, it isn’t storewide.
Christmas order cut-offs
Work out the last order date for Christmas delivery from Australia Post’s send dates and your own dispatch time. If you post orders the next business day, a customer ordering by Monday 21 December can still make the 22 December Parcel Post date within NSW (metro).
Show that date where people will see it while they shop:
- a banner across the store
- the product pages
- the cart and checkout
- the shipping information page
Once the date passes, change the message to say orders won’t arrive before Christmas. Gift cards delivered by email are worth promoting from that point, because they still arrive on time.
Returns policy
You don’t have to offer refunds for change of mind. If your policy offers them, though, you have to honour it. The ACCC’s small business guidance says you can say “No refunds for change of mind”, but you can’t say “No refunds”. Faulty goods are covered by the consumer guarantees whatever your policy says.
Gift buyers often look for this before they order. Put your policy on the product pages or link to it from the cart, and say whether gifts bought in December can be swapped in January.
Test before the rush
Place a test order on a phone, all the way through to the confirmation email. Check your stock levels and shipping rates too. A problem found on Black Friday morning costs a lot more than one found the week before. Our guide to setting up an online store covers the basics.
What to update for your type of business
| Business | What to update |
|---|---|
| Cafés and restaurants | Opening hours for each day from Christmas Eve to New Year’s Day, Christmas and New Year’s Eve menus as a web page rather than a PDF, and function or group booking details |
| Tradies | An on-call number for emergencies, the date you’re back for quotes, and any public holiday call-out rates |
| GP and allied health clinics | Closed dates in your booking platform, the clinic’s after-hours arrangement, healthdirect on 1800 022 222 and 000 for emergencies, and telehealth availability |
| NDIS providers | Which supports keep running over the break, and who participants and families should contact |
| Not-for-profits | Support contacts for anyone who needs help while you’re closed, and a donation page set up for your Christmas appeal |
We’ve covered each of these in more detail in our guides for cafés and restaurants, tradies, GP clinics, NDIS providers and not-for-profits.
Before you close
A website problem in the second week of January can go unnoticed for days. A few checks before you leave make that much less likely.
- Update a week early. Run WordPress, plugin and theme updates at least a week before you close. If an update breaks something, there’s time to fix it. Don’t run them on your last afternoon.
- Take a full backup. Back up the files and the database, and keep a copy somewhere other than your hosting account.
- Check renewal dates. Domain names and hosting plans that renew in December or January will lapse if the card on file has expired.
- Test the forms. Send yourself a test enquiry and check it arrives with the auto-reply attached.
- Know who to call. Write down who looks after the site and how to reach them over the break.
If you’d rather not deal with any of this, our WordPress support plans start at $149 a month and include updates, daily off-site backups, security scanning and uptime monitoring.
Checklist
By early December:
- Black Friday prices are scheduled and discount codes are tested
- The Christmas order cut-off is on the store, product pages and checkout
- The returns policy is up to date and easy to find
- WordPress, plugins and theme are updated, with a full backup taken
Before you close:
- Holiday hours are on the website, listed by date
- Special hours are set in Google Business Profile, including Monday 28 December
- A closure banner shows the date you’re back
- The contact form auto-reply, email out-of-office and voicemail all match
- Closed dates are blocked out in your booking system
- An after-hours or emergency contact is listed if customers need one
- Domain and hosting renewals are covered
When you’re back:
- Take the closure banner down
- Reopen your Google Business Profile if you marked it temporarily closed
- Reply to the enquiries that came in over the break
- Send a test enquiry to check the form still works
Next steps
Most of this takes an hour or two on your own site. If you’d like us to set up the closure banner, holiday hours and store changes for you, get in touch before mid-December and we’ll fit it in before our own break. We’re a Central Coast web design studio working with local businesses across the Coast.
