When on Holiday Mode

I’ve been away for a week or so, this morning I took my shop off holiday mode, then I thought I would do some editing for an upcoming Theme of the Day, what I normally do is , on the drop down menu, pick View Your Shop, then I pick the item an choose open in new tab, then edit this item. But when I choose View Your Shop, I was greeted by the message ’ This shop is empty, it has no stock ’ etc , now that is very BAD!!! Looks like I have emptied my shop and left Folksy. What is Folksy up to lately, first usless search facility, not showing your shop on Theme of the Day if you are on Holiday Mode, now telling visitors your shop is empty if you on Holiday mode. Glad I cancelled my Plus membership until they sort this shambles out

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I have just taken my shop off holiday mode, and everything re-appeared as normal, but I have heard others say it can take a few minutes to update.
Your stock is showing for me.

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I had that after taking my shop off of holiday mode a couple of times, and I was actually told by a customer. It appears that after a few minutes it fixes on its own and the shop appears as normal. Still not good, especially when you have the customer on the phone waiting for the items to appear while they are refreshing their browser, like it happened in my case :neutral_face:

I just checked your shop and you now appear as normal :relieved:

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I know my shop is back to normal, but I’m more worried about the notice say that the shop is empty! is being shown when you are on holiday mode.

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Steve, I think the “empty shop” is just a temporary thing that happens when you take the shop out of holiday mode - there is a note on the Holiday Mode page that says items may take a few minutes to appear.

But the shop shouldn’t be empty while actually on holiday. I just put my main shop on holiday mode to check, and all my items are still showing. There is just a note at the top that say’s shop on holiday, and the clicking on an individual item shows it as unavailable to buy.

I’ve attached screen shots below.


When I turned holiday mode off, I got the same message about empty shop that you had. I refreshed a few times - it took about 2 minutes for the items to show.

Maybe it’s worth you checking by putting your shop in holiday mode for a half hour at a quiet shopping time. If your items aren’t showing when actually “on holiday”, try contacting admin.

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It’s been doing that for years now. I used to put my shop in holiday mode before I was going to do a shop drop but those few minutes it would take for my items to show again was causing me worry about how long it would take to show up in my shop drop (If I told my customers it was going to be at 8pm sharp that’s when I wanted my items to show)

Now I hide all my new items and just unhide them at the right time. (Sorry, that’s just for the shop drop, I don’t do that if I am actually on holiday)

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I know that @Bearlescent has raised this issue too, the worst bit is, some shops are just closed with a banner saying something like ‘this shop is currently taking a break and orders can’t be processed’ other shops like yours was show are ‘this shop is empty’, that’s BAD for anyone who’s shop shows as the latter ….

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I think the holiday mode issue needs sorting, I don’t think we should go blind when we are on holiday, if we have stock in our shop then fine have a note saying we are on holiday and posting may be delayed but there is no reason why we shouldn’t show up in searches and it is something that really annoys me.
Surely there must be a way of distinguishing between a shop that has stock and taking a weeks break to those who have left but not closed their shops completely. Maybe it needs changing so that shops who are no longer actively selling have a different button to click so that they no longer appear in searches and those who are empty because they have sold all of their stock temporarily but are still actively selling on Folksy DO still show along with those on holiday mode.
On some other sites if a shop is away there is a note that pops up saying the items may be delayed but their items can stìll be found and customers can still place an order if they wish to. The seller would fill in details of when their shop will be able to post any items bought whilst they are away.
Not appearing in searches is not good for sellers ior for Folksy as potential orders may be missed. I might stop using the feature in future and if a sale happens to come through while I am away i will just message the customer and tell them it will be delayed.

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So looking back at old post about this( 2019 link below), Doug thinks it could be because they had been playing with the Search index on the site, coincidence that they have been making an almighty mess with the Search again,

We NEED customers to be able to see shops even if they are on holiday, otherwise they will not come back to buy (hopefully) when the seller is back from holiday, so seller gets some money , Folksy will get their share as well, Win Win situation.

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@PaintedHorseArt - the “This shop is empty” sign only shows for a few minutes while the shop is reset after turning off holiday mode.

As I explained in my response to Steve above, I did a check by turning my shop on holiday for a short while, and then back off again. It showed items - unavailable of course as in holiday mode - but the shop wasn’t “empty”. If people check for themselves and get a different result, best to email support, because that is not how it is supposed to work.

The issue raised by Debbi and Joy is different - items not appearing in Search (or gift guides etc) when shop is in holiday mode is new and unfair, and I agree it needs to be sorted. But someone going direct to your shop will see your items even when you are on holiday, and you can put a note in your announcement saying how long you will be away.

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As far as I concerned, the empty shop message shouldn’t be shown even if for 5 minutes when taking your shop off Holiday Mode, in that five minutes a prospective customer could stumble across it, not good, it should still say this shop is on holiday, there is no reason to have the empty shop notice showing.

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It just took just 2 minutes to refresh for me when I took it off holiday mode, which I’m not too concerned about. If I were, I’d probably try and do it very early in the morning or late evening when less people will be on the site.

It is frustrating, but there are many other things I’d rather admin were looking at - including the issue that we are not discoverable in Search for the whole of holiday mode.

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Sorry, but I think its unacceptable, don’t care if it’s 5 minutes or 2 minutes, it should not appear…