Manage Website Status and Notices

When To Use This#

Use this article when you are an owner or admin and you need to check what families see about your availability, set special hours, close until further notice, or post and cancel customer notices.

Before You Start#

• Sign in to the business app and confirm you are in the correct business account.
• Confirm you are allowed to publish public status updates before you set special hours or an emergency closure.
• Confirm you are allowed to publish notices before you create, publish, cancel, or review notice history.
• Review the customer-facing wording before you save, publish, or cancel anything.
• Follow your approved business policy before you post a closure, emergency, or limited-service message.

Public Status And Notices Overview#

Open the Public status & notices page to manage what families see about your availability and any announcements you post. The page is split into three tabs:

• Status shows your current availability and the tools for special hours and emergency closures.
• Notices is where you post, publish, and cancel titled announcements.
• Embed gives you the enrollment link, the public feed URL, and the widget code for an outside website.

Families see this status and any live notices in the customer portal and in any public website where the Hello Sniff status widget is embedded. Post customer-facing wording only after the copy and timing are approved by the business.

Availability#

The Availability card on the Status tab shows what families see right now. Hello Sniff derives this "Live now" state automatically from your weekly hours, your special hours, and any emergency closure. The card also shows the public message families see and when the status last updated.

You no longer set Open, Limited, or Closed by hand. The old manual status tool has been retired. To change what families see, use Special hours below for a dated change, or use the emergency closure control to close until further notice.

If a status was set with the retired manual tool, a "Set with retired controls" banner appears with a Clear button. Clearing it returns you to your regular hours; use Special hours for any future change. Older scheduled status changes that still exist are read-only and listed under Scheduled status changes (legacy); you can only Remove them, and no new ones can be created.

If you have view-only access, you can review the availability but only higher-permission staff can change it.

Special Hours#

On the Status tab, open + Make a change to set special hours without editing your regular weekly schedule.

• Pick a Start date and End date. Keep them the same for a single day, or extend the end date for a multi-day range. The end date never falls before the start.
• Choose the Change: close early, open late, closed all day, or custom hours. Enter the open or close times the change requires. Times use 15-minute increments, and the form snaps an off-grid time to the nearest quarter hour and blocks an invalid range (for example a closing time that is not after the opening time) so it cannot be submitted.
• Turn on Announce only when you want your message shown without blocking bookings. Leave it off to hold the affected bookings for review.
• Add an optional Customer message, which appears in the customer portal and the public status widget.

Before publishing, choose who to notify under Notify: affected booking families, all opted-in families, or no one. Pick Email, and SMS on plans that include texting. On a Starter plan the SMS option shows a Pro label and cannot be selected. When you choose No one, no customer messages are sent.

Select Preview impact to review the bookings that need attention and the number of email and text recipients before anything sends. The Publish special hours button stays disabled until the preview matches what is on screen. Publishing saves the change and sends any selected messages immediately, then the change tool collapses and the live card refreshes.

Published special hours are listed under Scheduled below the tool, where you can Remove a change so your regular weekly hours apply again. If a customer notice was already sent for that date, publishing again does not send it a second time. If a text cannot send because the monthly text limit is reached, the confirmation tells you the texts were not sent.

Only set special hours, and only send customer messages, with approved dates, wording, and timing.

Emergency Closure#

Use Close until further notice on the Status tab when you need to close right away. Activating an emergency closure blocks same-day online bookings, holds future-date bookings for staff review, and requires a reason on new staff bookings. Add an Emergency message that customers see while the closure is active, and leave Notify opted-in customers now on to send a one-time alert.

While an emergency closure is active, the control stays fully visible so you can find Clear emergency closure quickly. Clearing it returns your availability to your regular hours and special hours.

Only start or clear an emergency closure with approved wording and timing.

Notices And Drafts#

On the Notices tab, open + New notice to post a titled announcement, which is separate from your availability status. Choose the notice type, enter the title and body, and add optional start and end dates when the notice should only show during a window.

Select Save draft notice to hold it as a draft, then publish it only when the customer-facing copy is ready. Drafts are not shown to anyone until you publish them. Review the notice type, timing, title, and body before publishing.

Live Notices And Cancellations#

Live notices are listed under Live notices, and drafts and past notices appear under Drafts and notice history. Review each for title, body, timing, notice type, and live state. Publish a draft, or Cancel a live or historical notice only when the change is approved.

Successful create, publish, cancel, and status actions return to the page with a confirmation banner.

Portal And Onboarding Settings#

Older Portal shortcuts open this Public status & notices page, not a separate portal settings page. Customer portal setup, onboarding settings, and required document configuration are managed separately from public status and notices.

Use Configure The Customer Portal or Configure Customer Onboarding when the task is portal setup rather than a live public notice.

When Status Or Notice Controls Are Missing#

• If the special-hours or emergency controls are missing, ask an owner or admin to review public-status access on the Access page. See Manage Access and Invites.
• If notice controls, drafts, or history are missing, ask an owner or admin to review notice-publishing access on the Access page.
• If special hours will not publish, confirm you previewed the current details first, since the Publish button stays disabled until the preview matches what is on screen.
• If a notice will not save, confirm the notice type, title, and body are present.
• If publish or cancel fails, reopen the page, confirm the current state, and retry only after checking the current copy.
• If a closure, emergency, limited-status, support availability, or customer-facing timing is unclear, pause and get business approval.