Setting Working Days and Holidays

Delivery Promise for WooCommerce uses your working days and holidays to calculate realistic dispatch and delivery estimates.

This helps prevent the plugin from promising delivery dates that fall too early because of weekends, public holidays, warehouse closures, or other non-working days.

Why working days matter #

Many stores do not process or dispatch orders every day.

For example, if your warehouse works Monday to Friday, an order placed on Friday afternoon may not be processed again until Monday.

Delivery Promise uses your working day settings to skip days when your store does not process orders.

Where to configure working days #

To configure your working days:

1. Go to WooCommerce → Delivery Promise.
2. Open the General tab.
3. Find the Cutoff and Working Days section.
4. Select the days your store processes orders.
5. Save your changes.

Recommended working day setup #

For most stores, the recommended setup is:

Monday: enabled
Tuesday: enabled
Wednesday: enabled
Thursday: enabled
Friday: enabled
Saturday: disabled
Sunday: disabled

This means the plugin will calculate delivery estimates using Monday to Friday as working days.

Example #

Assume your settings are:

Working days: Monday–Friday
Processing time: 1–2 working days
Delivery time after dispatch: 2–3 working days

If a customer orders on Friday, the plugin skips Saturday and Sunday when calculating the delivery estimate.

Setting holidays and non-working dates #

Holidays and non-working dates are specific dates when your store does not process or dispatch orders.

These can include:

• public holidays
• warehouse closure dates
• company vacation days
• inventory count days
• special closure periods
• seasonal breaks

Where to add holidays #

To add holidays or non-working dates:

1. Go to WooCommerce → Delivery Promise.
2. Open the Calendar tab.
3. Find the Non-working dates section.
4. Add the date.
5. Add a label if needed.
6. Save your changes.

Example:

Date: 2026-12-25
Label: Christmas Day

How holidays affect delivery estimates #

When a holiday is added, Delivery Promise skips that date during calculation.

Example:

Working days: Monday–Friday
Holiday: Wednesday, July 1
Processing time: 1 working day
Delivery time after dispatch: 2 working days

If the order is placed on Tuesday, Wednesday is skipped because it is a holiday. The plugin continues the calculation from Thursday.

Difference between working days and holidays #

Working days are your regular weekly schedule.

Example:

Monday–Friday

Holidays are specific dates that should be skipped even if they fall on a normal working day.

Example:

2026-12-25 — Christmas Day

Use working days for your normal weekly pattern. Use holidays for exceptions.

Cutoff time and working days #

Your cutoff time works together with your working days.

Example:

Working days: Monday–Friday
Cutoff time: 14:00

If a customer orders on Monday at 10:00, same-day dispatch may still be possible.

If a customer orders on Monday at 16:00, the plugin starts from the next working day.

If a customer orders on Friday after the cutoff, the next working day may be Monday, because Saturday and Sunday are not working days.

Same-day countdown and non-working days #

The product page countdown only appears when same-day dispatch is possible.

The countdown will not appear if:

• today is not a working day
• today is a configured holiday
• the cutoff time has already passed
• the product cannot dispatch today
• a rule or product lead time requires extra processing days

Example:

If today is Sunday and Sunday is not a working day, the plugin will not show:

Order within 4 hrs 20 mins for dispatch today

Instead, it will show the normal delivery estimate or the configured alternative message.

Recommended holiday setup #

At minimum, add the public holidays or warehouse closure dates that affect your dispatch schedule.

Examples:

2026-01-01 — New Year’s Day
2026-12-25 — Christmas Day
2026-12-26 — Boxing Day

You can also add internal closure dates:

2026-08-10 — Warehouse inventory day
2026-12-24 — Early Christmas closure

Do holidays repeat every year? #

Holidays are added as specific dates.

If your store closes on the same holiday every year, add each year’s date separately.

This is recommended because some holidays move from year to year, and different countries have different public holiday calendars.

Testing your calendar settings #

After configuring working days and holidays, use the Delivery Promise Tester to confirm the result.

1. Go to WooCommerce → Delivery Promise.
2. Open the Tester tab.
3. Select a product.
4. Choose a shipping method and destination if needed.
5. Set the test date/time.
6. Run the test.

The tester will show whether a date was skipped because it was a weekend, non-working day, or holiday.

Example setup: Monday–Friday warehouse #

Use this setup if your store processes orders only during the business week:

Working days: Monday–Friday
Cutoff time: 14:00
Holidays: public holidays and warehouse closures

This is suitable for most stores with a normal warehouse or office-based fulfillment schedule.

Example setup: Saturday dispatch #

Use this setup if your store also processes orders on Saturday:

Working days: Monday–Saturday
Cutoff time: 12:00
Sunday: disabled

This allows Saturday to be used in delivery calculations, but still skips Sunday.

Example setup: seven-day dispatch #

Use this setup if your store processes orders every day:

Working days: Monday–Sunday

Only use this if your team truly processes and dispatches orders every day.

Troubleshooting #

Delivery estimates are too early #

Check:

• weekends are disabled if your store does not process orders on weekends
• holidays are added correctly
• cutoff time is correct
• product lead times are configured correctly
• the matching delivery rule is not using shorter timing than expected

Delivery estimates are too late #

Check:

• working days are not accidentally disabled
• too many holidays were added
• processing days are not too high
• transit days are not too high
• a specific rule or product lead time is overriding the default

Countdown is not showing #

Check:

• today is enabled as a working day
• today is not added as a holiday
• the current time is before the cutoff
• the product is in stock
• processing minimum days allows same-day dispatch

A holiday is not being skipped #

Check:

• the date was saved correctly
• the date format is correct
• the plugin settings were saved
• the Delivery Promise Tester is using the expected test date
• no custom rule is overriding the expected behavior

Best practices #

Use realistic working days and holidays. It is better to show a slightly wider delivery range than to promise a date your store cannot meet.

Review your holiday list before busy seasons such as Black Friday, Christmas, New Year, and national holidays.

If your warehouse changes schedule seasonally, update your working days and holidays before the change takes effect.