# Set Business Hours per Publisher

You can now give each **Publisher** its own weekly **business hours** a time zone and **caps** on those hours. Outside the hours or once a cap is reached, Retreaver rejects the Publisher's RTB pings and the calls to its numbers before any Buyer is pinged or dialed.

## What's new

- A **Business Hours** card on every Publisher's page, with an **Edit Business Hours** button. The card shows each day's time windows and for each window, its hard cap and concurrency cap with their current counts.
- A time zone per Publisher. Hours are always read in the Publisher's own time zone, not yours or the caller's.
- Caps on each time window:
  - **Hard cap**: how many calls the window may take. It counts a call when it connects or when it converts, as set by the window's **Cap Trigger** and resets at the start of each week in the Publisher's time zone.
  - **Concurrency cap**: how many of the Publisher's calls may be live at once while the window is open. It is available on accounts that have concurrency caps on business hours enabled.
- A new check on incoming traffic. When the Publisher is closed or the current window's hard cap or concurrency cap is reached:
  - **RTB pings** attributed to the Publisher are answered with `"status": "rejected"`. A ping is attributed to the Publisher when its RTB key is tied to the Publisher, when it names the Publisher (`affiliate_id`, `publisher_id` or `source_id`), or when it names no Publisher but its inbound number belongs to one.
  - **Inbound calls** to the Publisher's numbers are rejected before routing. The caller hears a busy signal or your greeting followed by a hang-up if the call plays one.
  - The call's debug log says why: "Publisher [name] is closed, ending the call.", "Publisher [name] is capped, ending the call." or "Publisher [name] is currently simulcapped …".
- RTB reservations count toward a Publisher's hard cap the same way they count toward a Number's: when the reservation is confirmed, or on the first request if the RTB key has **Add to caps on status 'reserved'** turned on.
- A **Publisher Closed** notice on the page of each Number whose Publisher is closed, so it's clear why that number's calls are rejected even when the number's own hours are open.

## How to use it

1. Open **Publishers** and select a Publisher.
![Screenshot 2026 10 08 at 7.35.58 PM](/media/7f/7f32e58b70f4dcbe64f5f8193598f936d37ba8ab260e6630b1ff4c657601897d.png)
3. On the **Business Hours** card, click **Edit Business Hours**.
4. Pick a preset (**Open 24-7**, **Open 9-5 M-F** or **Noon Lunch**) or set each day yourself: switch a day off to close it or give it one or more time windows.
5. To cap a window, enter a hard cap next to it and choose its **Cap Trigger**. An empty cap means no cap. If your account has concurrency caps on business hours, you can also enter a concurrency cap.
6. Choose the **Business Hours Time Zone**.
7. Click **Save Business Hours**.

The new schedule and caps apply from the next ping or call.

### Through the Retreaver MCP server

`affiliates.read` returns each Publisher's `time_zone` and `business_hours` with their row IDs and `affiliates.manage` accepts both. You can ask your AI assistant, for example, to "close Acme Leads on Sundays" and it can update that day's row. Caps are set in the app.

## Migration notes

- **Existing Publishers keep taking traffic around the clock** until someone sets their hours. Each one starts with the open week, 0:00 to 24:00 every day and no caps.
- **Existing Publishers start in UTC.** Check the time zone the first time you set their hours.
- **New Publishers** start open every day, 0:00 to 24:00, with no caps, in the time zone of the user who created them, in the app. Publishers created any other way, for example while adding a number, start in UTC.

## Permissions and access

- **Superusers** can view and edit a Publisher's hours and caps on its page and its hours through the API and MCP. Read-only superusers get the Business Hours card, as on a Buyer's page.
- **Publisher collaborators** can't see a Publisher's hours or caps and don't see the Publisher Closed or Publisher Paused notices.
- **Media Buyer collaborators** don't get the Business Hours card on a Publisher's page.

## Notes and caveats

- **Retreaver still receives the pings.** A closed or capped Publisher's pings are answered right away and never reach a Buyer.
- **The RTB response doesn't say why.** A ping rejected because the Publisher is closed or capped receives the same response as other rejections. The specific reason can be found in the call's debug log.
- **Hard caps reset weekly, not daily.** A cap on Monday's window counts that window's calls until the reset at the start of the next week. To cap each day, set a cap on each day's window.
- **A concurrency cap counts all of the Publisher's live calls,** across all its numbers and campaigns.
- **A window can't cross midnight.** Split an overnight window across two days, for example Friday 20:00 to 24:00 and Saturday 0:00 to 2:00.
- **Each Publisher has a weekly schedule**, with optional caps on each time window. Existing Publishers start open every day, 0:00 to 24:00, with no caps, so nothing changes for them until you set their hours.

## Next step

Open one of your **Publishers**, click **Edit Business Hours** on its Business Hours card and set the hours and caps you agreed with that Publisher.