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How come bookings can books appointments outside business hours?

Samuel Bailey 20 Reputation points
2026-03-18T18:29:48.98+00:00

Hello,

Clients are managing to book meetings outside of the calendar.. I've seen another post from last year June 2025 and I've read the answer and done all that was recommended but it hasn't changed. Is there something wrong with the system? A bug in the code or something?

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Lia V 6,550 Reputation points Microsoft External Staff Moderator
2026-03-18T19:49:36.1+00:00

Hi @Samuel Bailey,

Thank you for reaching out with your question regarding booking appointments outside of the expected business hours.

If the unexpected availability occurred around the recent clock change, that would explain why 9:00 AM appeared available while 8:00 AM did not. Microsoft Bookings relies on time‑zone conversion (using UTC internally), and during Daylight Saving Time transitions, availability can temporarily appear shifted by one hour if time‑zone settings are not fully aligned.

In this scenario, this would not indicate a bug in the system or an issue with the booking rules themselves, but rather expected behavior related to the DST adjustment. If availability now aligns correctly with your defined business hours following the clock change, that would be consistent with the observed behavior.

To help avoid similar confusion during future time changes, it’s recommended to verify that the booking page time zone is set correctly and that “Always show time slots in business time zone” is enabled on the booking page. You can do this by:

  • Open Microsoft Bookings > Select your shared booking page.
  • Go to the Booking page tab > Expand Region and time zone settings > Verify the Current time zone is set correctly.
  • Enable Always show time slots in business time zone > Save your changes. User's image

However, if after verifying these settings, bookings are still being accepted outside the expected hours, it may require a deeper technical review. In such cases, the best next step is contacting your organization’s IT administrator to open a support ticket with Microsoft. A technical support engineer can initiate a remote session, assess backend configurations, and perform diagnostics. If necessary, they can escalate the matter to a specialized team for further investigation.

As moderators, our primary goal is to provide helpful guidance and support through general troubleshooting steps. While we don’t have access to internal systems or administrative tools required to resolve account-specific or backend issues, we truly appreciate your understanding of these limitations. We genuinely hope the information we share helps point you in the right direction, and we're always here to assist as much as we can within our scope.

For guidance on how to request support, your IT administrator can follow the steps in this article to create a Support ticket: Get support - Microsoft 365 admin | Microsoft Learn.

I hope this information is useful. Thank you for taking the time to raise this question. If you need any further clarification or assistance, please feel free to leave a comment under this post.

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  1. Samuel Bailey 20 Reputation points
    2026-03-18T19:07:42.8733333+00:00

    I've just been told that it's due to the clocks changing on Sunday - it's why 9am was available and not 8am

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  2. AI answer

    2026-03-18T18:30:06.0033333+00:00

    Bookings uses the business rules configured on the calendar. If customers can book outside expected hours, it is almost always due to configuration rather than a platform bug.

    Key points to check:

    1. Business hours
    • Bookings won’t allow appointments outside the configured businessHours for the booking calendar.
    • If business hours are set too broadly (for example, 00:00–23:59), customers will see and can book those times.
    • Verify and tighten the business hours in the Bookings calendar settings so they match the actual working window.
    1. Scheduling policy (time window when bookings are allowed)
    • The bookingSchedulingPolicy controls when bookings can be made:
      • Time increments (Time slot interval): defines the duration of each appointment slot.
      • Minimum lead time: minimum time before an appointment can be made or canceled.
      • Maximum lead time: maximum time in advance an appointment can be made.
    • Ensure these values are set correctly so customers cannot book at times that should be blocked (for example, too short a lead time or too long a window).
    1. Time zone behavior
    • All configured working hours and settings are in the business time zone.
    • The self-service page can show times in the customer’s local time zone unless Always show time slots in business time zone is enabled.
    • If customers are in different time zones, a slot that appears “outside hours” to staff might still be inside the configured business hours when converted to the business time zone.
    • Confirm the business time zone is correct and, if needed, enable the option to always show slots in the business time zone.
    1. Staff availability vs. business hours
    • Staff time zone and business hours are in the business time zone; there is no separate staff time zone setting.
    • If staff calendars show as free (for example, all-day events marked as Free instead of Busy), Bookings will treat those times as available even if staff consider themselves unavailable.
    • Ensure personal/all-day events that should block bookings are marked Busy.
    1. Admin overrides and Graph/API usage
    • Only administrators can override Bookings rules.
    • If appointments are created or updated via Microsoft Graph with application permissions, they must still adhere to the business rules. If a custom integration is in use, verify it respects businessHours and bookingSchedulingPolicy.

    If, after verifying business hours, scheduling policy, time zone, and staff calendar status, customers can still consistently book outside the defined business hours in the business time zone, that would be an anomaly and should be escalated via a support ticket with concrete examples (specific service, staff, and timestamps) so logs and configuration can be reviewed.

    References:

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