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Incorrect hours can block customers from submitting inquiries, leading to missed revenue and a poor experience. Keeping your hours accurate ensures your forms remain accessible.
Changing Your Operating Hours
The hours shown on your inquiry forms are the hours you set under Operating Hours.
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To set/update them, log in to your SpotHopper account and navigate to Settings → Hours.
- Expand Operating Hours using the plus sign, as shown in the image below.
- Next, add your hours of operation there, and click on "Save Operating Hours."
These will be the hours shown on your website (unless you have descriptive hours set) and used for your inquiry forms.
⚠️ "Descriptive hours" only affect what’s displayed on your website. They do not impact inquiry forms, available time slots, or when customers can submit requests.
Customizing Other Settings
Once your Operating Hours are set, they define the full window of availability for your inquiry forms:
- Your opening time sets the earliest possible inquiry slot
- Your closing time sets the latest possible inquiry slot
- All time in between is treated as available by default
From there, you can further refine availability by blocking off specific hours/days and adjusting timing settings for each inquiry type.
Use the options below to customize how and when customers can submit inquiries.
Block-Off Hours
Blocking off hours means blocking specific times on the calendar, so your customers can't make inquiries during that time.
If you have separate lunch and dinner hours with a closure in between, then block-off hours are necessary to prevent inquiries during that time.
To add Block-Off hours, navigate to Settings → Hours, and click the "Block Off Time" button.
You can add block-off hours for specific dates or recurring days of the week.
Select the date or day, then click "Add Blocked Hours." A time entry field will appear where you can enter the hours you want to block.
By default, all inquiry forms (and walk-ins) will be blocked during that time. You can adjust this by toggling specific sections:
- Leave everything set to Closed if the restaurant is not accepting any inquiries
Toggle specific inquiry types to Open if you only want to block certain requests (for example, orders).
When finished, click "Save" in the lower-right corner to apply the blocked hours.
You can always check or update the blocked hours directly from the "Settings" tab on each of the Inquiry pages.
For more information on blocking hours or entire days, see our "How to Block Off Days and Hours" article.
Timing Settings
In addition to Operating Hours and block-off times, timing settings allow you to customize how time slots appear on your inquiry forms.
To access these settings, go to the Settings tab on each inquiry page (Parties, Catering, Reservations, Online Orders) to adjust availability and limit when inquiries can be submitted.
Private Parties and Catering
For private parties and catering, you can control how time slots appear by setting:
- A time increment, which determines how far apart time slots are displayed (e.g., 7:00, 7:30, 8:00)
- A minimum turnaround time, which defines how far in advance a request must be made
Reservations
For reservations, you can customize availability by setting:
- A time increment, which determines how far apart time slots are displayed
- How close to closing time the last reservation can be booked
- A minimum lead time, which defines how far in advance a reservation must be made (e.g., with a 1-hour lead time, a 7:00 PM reservation cannot be booked after 6:00 PM)
Orders
For online orders, you can configure separate timing settings for pickup and delivery.
You can control:
- How soon after opening orders can be scheduled
- How close to closing time orders can be placed
- A turnaround time, which determines how much time is needed to prepare an order and directly impacts the earliest available time slot