SLA calendars in JSM done right: tips, tricks and time-savers 📅🪄

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Global teams don’t work a perfect 9–5, and your SLAs shouldn’t either. Customize calendars to mirror your team’s real-world schedule, down to the hour.

In the final article of our SLA best practices series, we explore how to tailor calendars in Jira Service Management. 

We'll show you how to set up SLA pauses for weekends and public holidays. Plus, you'll learn pro tips and add-ons for scaling SLA calendars across time zones and multiple JSM projects.

          

               Yes, you can automatically import all national holidays. Read more below ↓

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Add a single holiday to avoid breaches

Why this matters: One public holiday can silently nudge issues into breach if your calendar stays 24/7.

🔧 How to do it

1. Go to Space settings → SLAs → Calendar icon in the upper right corner.
   
   
2. Edit your calendar (or create one if you’re still on 24/7).
   
   
3. In Holidays → Add new. Then add its name, choose date and frequency (one-time / annually), and Save. From now on, SLA time will not be counted on that date.
   
   

✅ Quick win
Create a test issue with an active SLA and check that the Remaining time doesn’t drop on the holiday. 

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Import a full holiday set for a region

Why this matters: Manually adding 30+ holidays? No thanks. For full-country calendars, imports are faster and reduce human error.

🔧 How to do it

1. Prepare a .ICS file with regional holidays from a trusted source.
   
   
2. In Space settings → SLAs → Calendars, open your calendar.
   
   
3. Use Import ICS, upload the file, review, and Save.

✅ Quick win
Pick a test issue and verify that time doesn’t count on imported dates.

🧩 Native capability
If you copy the entire calendar to a different project, it will be replicated with all configured holidays.

✨ Light assist
Using the SLA Time Management app, you can automatically import holidays from an official calendar database for various countries or reuse a calendar you’ve already configured.

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Handle weekends cleanly (work vs. non-work)

Why this matters: Weekends are one of the biggest causes of silent SLA breaches—especially if your calendar runs 24/7.

🔧 How to do it

1. Open Space settings → SLAs → Calendars.
   
   
2. Under Work Week, uncheck Sat/Sun to exclude weekends—or enable them and add time slots if you do weekend coverage.
   
   
3. Add different/multiple time slots if needed (e.g., Sat 9:00–11:00; 13:00–15:00).
4. Save.

💡 Tip
If no calendar is attached, your SLAs run 24/7, weekends included. Attach a calendar to stop accidental weekend breaches.

🧩 Where native can stop short

 Consistency across many projects can be hard to maintain manually.

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Align support calendars with the client's location

Why this matters: A mismatch between customer time zones and SLA calendars can lead to a longer time to resolution. That’s why it’s crucial to adapt service based on time zones.

🔧 How to do it

(Deviniti support-recommended method in the native JSM)

1. Create a custom dropdown field in Jira called "Customer location details" (you can name it differently; this’s just an example). 
2. Add this field to your Customer Portal form and make it mandatory.
3. Go to Space settings → SLAs.
4. Create calendars for each regional team, including work hours and holidays.
5. Add an SLA and configure a goal.
6. In "Apply to work items," use JQL to match requests based on a previously created custom field called (in this example, it’s named “Customer location details”).
7. Assign the correct calendar and duration for each region.
8. Add all relevant customer regions to ensure SLAs map accurately.
9. Set conditions for when the SLA should start, pause, and stop.
10. Choose your SLA display format—either countdown (time-centric) or deadline (due date-centric).
11. Save your changes.

🧩 Where native can stop short

Out of the box, JSM doesn’t fully support regional calendars. For teams spread across time zones, consider an SLA management app to centralize and automate regional SLA calendars.

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Quick check

Before you roll out, here’s a 4-step check to confirm your calendar setup is airtight.

1. Create a test issue with an active SLA (e.g., Time to resolution).
   
   
2. Note Remaining time.
   
   
3. Watch it over a weekend/holiday with the calendar attached, time should not decrease when you’re closed.
   
   
4. If you changed calendars after the fact and numbers look off, run a recalculation (automation for open issues; marketplace app for closed/historical).
   
   

Final recap

Instead of a classic summary, we’d like to leave you with a short cheatsheet. It will come in handy when you need to dive deeper into SLA calendars in Jira Service Management. 

• Attach a calendar to every SLA goal (avoid 24/7 by default).
  
  
• Exclude weekends or define weekend hours using time slots.
  
  
• Import a regional .ICS holiday set; schedule a yearly refresh.
  
  
• If you manage many projects, centralize calendars/rules to avoid repeat admin.

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Thanks for reading!

What’s your team trick for handling regional holidays or odd weekends? Drop it in the comments, let’s compare notes ;)