Working hours are the outer boundary of your availability. They control when the booking calendar shows "available" to clients, and when it shows "closed." Get these right and you'll never receive a booking request for a Tuesday evening when you're unavailable, or a Sunday when you're off.
To set them: go to Settings → Working Hours.
Opening hours, setting your typical week
You'll see each day of the week listed. For each day you can:
Toggle open or closed, a simple switch. When a day is set to Closed, clients simply can't pick that day when booking through the portal. Saturday and Sunday default to closed; flip them open if you work weekends.
Set start and end times, for open days, enter the times you're available. For example, 08:00 to 18:00 means nothing can be booked before 8 in the morning or after 6 in the evening. Here's a typical week for a dog-walking business:
| Day | Status | Hours |
|---|---|---|
| Monday | Open | 08:00 to 18:00 |
| Tuesday | Open | 08:00 to 18:00 |
| Wednesday | Open | 08:00 to 18:00 |
| Thursday | Open | 08:00 to 18:00 |
| Friday | Open | 08:00 to 18:00 |
| Saturday | Closed | |
| Sunday | Closed |
Add breaks, you can also add breaks within a day using the "+ Add break" option. This blocks out a period in the middle of the day, useful for a lunch break or a school run. For example, if you're unavailable 12:30 to 13:30, a break stops any bookings landing in that window.
When you're happy with the week, hit Save.
Key connection: Working hours = when you're open = when clients can book. If you work 08:00 to 18:00 on weekdays, a client using your portal won't see any time slots outside those hours. The calendar shows the same boundary for you when you're creating bookings manually too.
Closures and holidays
Below the weekly hours is a Closures & holidays section. This is for one-off closed days, your annual holiday, a training day, or a bank holiday when you're not working.
Adding UK bank holidays
Barclo has a handy button that adds all UK bank holidays for the current and next year in one click, things like Christmas Day, Easter Monday, and Spring Bank Holiday. You don't have to type them in yourself. Once added, those dates are marked as closed and Barclo won't accept bookings on them.
You can remove any bank holiday that doesn't apply to you (for example, if you do work on bank holidays) by clicking the delete button next to it.
Adding custom closures
Going on holiday? Click Add custom closure, enter a name (e.g. "Annual leave") and the date(s). Clients won't be able to book those dates through the portal, and you'll see the closure flagged on the calendar.
How working hours differ from service times
A common question: "What's the difference between my working hours and the times I set on my services?"
Working hours are the outer boundary, the widest window when bookings are possible. Service durations and walk-slot times sit inside that boundary. For example, if your working hours are 08:00 to 18:00 and you have a walk slot at 09:00 to 11:00, the slot must fall within the working hours window, which it does.
Think of it as: working hours = the shop is open; services and walk slots = what you're selling inside the shop.
Seasons change, so should your hours. It's common to run longer hours in summer when days are longer and demand is higher, and shorter hours in winter. You can update your working hours any time, changes take effect immediately for future bookings.
Note: Changing working hours doesn't affect existing bookings that have already been confirmed. It only applies to new bookings going forward.