Guide · For small business owners
Closed for the holidays? A phone plan for small businesses
Holiday hours on Google, holiday voicemail greeting examples, urgent calls and callbacks. What your customers need on the days you're closed.
Fall and winter are holiday season for small businesses. Thanksgiving, in October in Canada and November in the US. Then Christmas, Boxing Day and New Year's. Your office closes for a day or two at a time, sometimes for a whole week.
It's also the season when furnaces quit, pipes freeze, and people finally book the appointment they've put off all year. The phone doesn't take the holidays off.
Now imagine a holiday morning from your customer's side. It's 9 AM. Their heat won't come on and the house is getting cold. Or a back tooth cracked at last night's dinner. Or they've just driven past a house for sale and want to see it before someone else does. They call you. What happens next decides whether they wait for you or call someone else.
Your plan for the holidays comes down to giving that caller four things.
1. To know you're closed: set your holiday hours
Many people look you up before they dial. If Google says you're open and nobody answers, you've lost their trust before you've said a word. Put your holiday hours where they look:
- Google. In your Google Business Profile, open Edit profile → Hours → Special hours, pick the date and mark it Closed (or set shorter hours). Your regular hours stay as they are. (Special hours only show if your profile is set to Open with main hours.) Google also suggests confirming your hours for official holidays, even when they don't change.
- Your website. A one-line banner is enough: "Closed [day] for [holiday]. Back [day] at 8 AM."
- Everywhere else they reach you. Your Facebook page, your booking page, and a holiday out-of-office message on your email and website contact form. Customers who can't get you by phone often try those next.
Set them a week ahead, so customers who plan ahead see them too.
2. To hear when you're back: your holiday voicemail greeting
A caller who reaches plain voicemail on a holiday can't tell if you're closed for the day or just not picking up. Your greeting should answer that in the first few seconds. Keep it under 20 seconds, and always include three things: when you're back, what to do if it's urgent, and that you'll call back.
For a single day (Thanksgiving, Christmas Day, New Year's Day):
"Thanks for calling [business]. We're closed today for [holiday] and back tomorrow at 8 AM. If this is a life-threatening emergency, hang up and call 911. If it's urgent, [how to reach your on-call person]. Otherwise, leave your name, number and what you need, and we'll call you back first thing tomorrow."
For a longer closure (between Christmas and New Year's):
"Thanks for calling [business]. We're closed for the holidays from [date] and back on [date] at 8 AM. If this is a life-threatening emergency, hang up and call 911. For anything urgent, [how to reach your on-call person]. Leave your name, number and what you need, and we'll call you back the morning we're back. Happy holidays."
Two checks before you leave:
- If you record calls, keep your recording notice in the greeting. Many places expect you to tell callers before you record, and some US states require everyone on the call to agree.
- If you forward your line to a cell phone, call it from another phone to make sure it rings where you think it does.
3. A way through if it can't wait
Most holiday calls can wait a day. A few can't, and your caller knows which kind theirs is. Give the urgent ones a way through, or they'll find one with another business. Decide before the holiday what counts:
- Home services: no heat or no cooling with a baby or an older person at home, water actively leaking, a frozen or burst pipe, no power to part of the house.
- Dental: severe pain, facial swelling, a knocked-out or badly broken tooth.
- Real estate: a buyer's offer deadline, a problem on a closing day.
Then pick one person who is on call for each holiday, and the hours they'll cover. Make sure they know it, and that their phone is charged. They don't have to watch it all day: checking messages at set times, say noon and 5 PM, works for most businesses. A two-line text tells a worried customer they've been heard: "Got your message. We'll call you first thing tomorrow morning."
Anything life-threatening isn't a call for your business at all: heavy bleeding, trouble breathing or swallowing, smoke or fire. Callers should hear: call 911. If they smell gas, they should leave the building first, then call 911 or the gas company from outside.
4. A call back when you said
Your greeting made a promise. Your callers are holding you to it. On your first morning back, call in this order:
- Urgent calls first, even if the on-call person already helped. A quick "how did it go?" is remembered.
- New customers next. They don't know you yet, so they have the least reason to wait.
- Everyone else before lunch.
Then switch your greeting back. A holiday message still playing after you're open makes a caller wonder if anyone is there.
Where an AI assistant fits
Some businesses hand the holiday phone to an AI assistant instead of voicemail. For the caller, the difference is being answered rather than recorded. A good assistant answers with your business name and says up front that it's an AI. It tells callers you're closed and when you're back, and takes their details. It gets urgent calls to whoever is on call. You start your first morning back with each call written down, and the urgent ones already flagged.
If you try one, call it yourself before the holiday, the way a customer would. Check that it uses your real holiday hours, that it knows what counts as urgent for your business, and that it never promises something your team can't keep, like a price or an arrival time.
Your holiday checklist
Use it before every holiday this fall and winter:
- Holiday hours on Google, your website and social pages
- Holiday out-of-office message on email and your website contact form
- Holiday voicemail greeting recorded, with your return day and time
- Forwarding tested from another phone
- Urgent calls defined, and one person on call
- Callbacks done in order your first morning back
- Normal greeting back on
Flogenta sets up AI assistants that answer calls for small businesses, including on the days you're closed. Want to hear what your callers would hear? Call Flo and she'll answer as your business. Questions? hello@flogenta.com