How to create a time period record

Search for	Example	Results
A single word	`cat`	Topics that contain the word "cat". You will also find its grammatical variations, such as "cats".
A phrase. You can specify that the search results contain a specific phrase.	`"cat food"` (quotation marks)	Topics that contain the literal phrase "cat food" and all its grammatical variations. Without the quotation marks, the query is equivalent to specifying an OR operator, which finds topics with one of the individual words instead of the phrase.

Search for	Operator	Example
Two or more words in the same topic	`AND` `and` `+` (plus symbol) `&` (ampersand)	`cat AND dog` `"cat food"+milk` `"cat food"&"dog food"`
Either word in a topic	`OR` `or` `\|` (pipe)	`cat OR dog` `cat \| dog`
Topics that do not contain a specific word or phrase	`NOT` `not` `!` (exclamation point)	`NOT cat` `! dog`
Topics that contain one string and do not contain another	`^` (caret)	`cat ^ mouse`
A combination of search types	`( )` parentheses	`cat + (dog \| mouse)` `cat \| dog + (! mouse)`

From the main menu, select Plan > Time Period. Service Management displays the available time periods.

Service Management includes the following time period views:

Holidays & events
Maintenance & blackouts
Work schedules

Click New icon New.

Complete the General section.

This section contains basic information about the time period.

Field	Description
Title	A title for the time period. Best practice: choose a meaningful, descriptive, and relatively short title. Titles are often the only identification used in selection lists and in other areas to identify components.
Description	A description that captures the nature of the time period.
Type	The type of time period. For more information about types of time period, see Time periods.
Owning group	The group responsible for managing the time period.
Owner	The person responsible for dealing with the time period. The drop-down list displays only people who are members of the owning group.

Complete the Scheduling section.

In this section, using scheduling rules, you set the start and end time for the time period, and specify repeat occurrences daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly. You can set more than one scheduling rule.

Tip To avoid potential issues with Service Level Management calculations, you should ensure every time period has a duration greater than zero.

For a Blackout, Event, Holiday, or Maintenance time period

Select the Time zone you want to apply to the time period.
Note
- Because Holiday time periods have their own time zone, if you use the same holiday set in different time zones, you must create a fresh set of Holiday time periods for each of the relevant time zones.
- If you do not select a time zone, Service Management uses UTC as the default.
- All times set in the Scheduling section use the selected time zone.
- If you change the time zone, all times set in the Scheduling section remain unaltered, but use the newly selected time zone.
Select Recurring event or One time event.
For a Recurring event:
- Select the Start time and End time of the event. Alternatively, you may select the Start time and the Duration. Then Service Management automatically calculates the End time.
- Select how often and when you want the event to repeat.
- Select the Effective from date and the Until date to define between which dates the event is to occur.
  Note
  - In a recurring event, if the Effective from date and the first occurrence are not the same, Service Management automatically aligns these by changing the Effective from date to be the same as the first occurrence.
    
    For example, assume you defined a rule that repeats every Monday, effective from January 1, 2015. As January 1, 2015 is a Thursday, the effective from date becomes the first Monday after January 1, 2015, namely January 5, 2015.
  - In a recurring event, you can set the Until date to be a maximum of three years from the Effective from date.
  - In a recurring event, if the Until date is during an occurrence of the time period, that part of the time period due after the Until date is canceled.
    
    For example, assume you create a Maintenance time period that occurs every Saturday (for 24 hours) and Sunday (for 24 hours), recurring for three years. Also assume the three years expires at noon on the Saturday. In such a case, the part of the final Maintenance time period from noon on Saturday to midnight on Sunday, is canceled.
For a One time event:
- Select the Start time.
- Select the End time.
Click Add rule to add another scheduling rule.

For a Work schedule time period

Select Recurring event or One time event.
For a Recurring event:
- Select the Start time, and End time of the event. Alternatively, you may select the Start time and the Duration. Then Service Management automatically calculates the End time.
- By default the time period is set to repeat every week. Select which days of the week you want to include.
For a One time event:
- Select the Start time.
- Select the End time.
Alternatively, you may select the Start time and All day event.
Click Add rule to add another scheduling rule.

Example:

Assume you are defining the Work schedule time period for a retail business which normally operates from Monday through Saturday. You define 9.00 A.M. to 5.00 P.M. Monday to Saturday, as the Work schedule.

Although Sunday is not in the work Schedule, the business does operate on the Sunday before a major holiday. Therefore, you add this day to make it part of the Work schedule. You do this by adding a rule, specifying the relevant date, to the Work schedule.
In the Holidays section, click Add to associate a holiday with the Work schedule.

Service Level Management calculations and Holidays

Service Management allows you to define Holiday time periods as exceptions from Work schedules. While a Work schedule is generic for all time zones, Holiday time periods have a specific time zone.

Service Level Management calculations for a business in a particular time zone, use the Work schedule, taking into account the holidays that apply to that time zone.

For example, assume you have created Holiday time periods for three different time zones:
- America/Toronto
- Europe/Rome
- US/Pacific
You associate each of these with the Work schedule.

Now also assume there is a Service Level Agreement. A relevant Service Level Target (SLT) definition applies to the Europe/Rome time zone.

When performing Service Level Management calculations for that Service Level Agreement, Service Management uses the Work schedule, and takes into account the Europe/Rome Holiday time period from the SLT definition. It ignores the America/Toronto and US/Pacific Holiday time periods.

Complete the Applies to section.

In this section, you specify to what services the time period applies.

Click All if you want the time period to apply to all services.
Click Services if you want to specify the services to which the time period should apply. Then type the relevant services in the box that is now displayed. You can search for services using the icon at the right side of the box.

The Applies to section is not relevant and is not displayed for a Work schedule time period.

Click Save.

For an example of how to create a Work schedule time period, see Example Work schedule creation.

Note When you add a new time period, Service Management automatically creates the workflow and displays the time period in draft status.

Click the workflow tab for the time period to see the workflow and status.
To change the status to active, you must have the appropriate rights. For more information about time period status, see How to activate a time period record.

How to create a time period record

Related topics