Daylight saving time (DST) is the practice of moving clocks forward to make the most of natural light during warmer months. While the time shift is only one hour, it can bring unexpected challenges. It’s especially frustrating for folks who are working or connecting across different time zones. Here are some common ways DST affects daily life and work, plus how Teamup can help minimize the impact and keep you on track.
DST isn’t observed everywhere. In fact, only 71 countries participate in DST in 2024. However, these days, we’re globally connected. We have friends and family across time zones, and we work across international lines in many cases. So even where daylight saving time isn’t observed, people feel the impact as there’s an additional degree of complication. Coordinating events across time zones gets tricky when clocks shift for daylight savings in one area, but not in another.
Top 5 DST challenges
Here are some of the issues that might pop up in different scenarios.
International meeting and schedule coordination
Got global organizations and international business professionals, scheduling means thinking about multiple time zones. Since DST isn’t observed consistently worldwide, there’s an additional layer of complexity in the spring and fall when clocks shift for certain areas but not for others. If schedulers aren’t aware of these changes (and their variations in different regions), it’s easy to end up with misalignment in work hours, missed calls, or delayed responses.
⏰ Make sure your calendar or scheduling tools support automatic time conversion with DST taken into account. Pay attention to the lead time zone if your work involves recurring meetings.
Travel and commuting schedules
Railway scheduling can get a little complicated. For example, in the Netherlands: “In the night when the summer time goes to winter time, there is therefore an extra hour, and so two trains run at the same time, but then at the moment that the summer time passes to the winter time. An extra train is then simply inserted. This then departs at 2.04 a.m. and in the new time difference an hour later also at 2:04 a.m.”
Airlines also have to do some careful DST calculations, mostly to make sure crew members get adequate rest periods and aren’t thrown off when their normal time zone changes are made even more dramatic by DST shifts.
For individual travelers, DST changes can disrupt travel schedules, especially with flights or public transportation that operate across different time zones. Adjusting to the time change can also result in jet lag, making trips more exhausting. If you live near time zone borders or commute across time zones for work, DST transitions add confusion to the normal routines. The time differences shift, so you have to rethink your commute and workable hours for meetings and appointments.
⏰ Most time zone converters allow you to find the offset between two time zones, or convert the time in one time zone to another one event at a time. You can do the conversion math yourself, but that’s cumbersome too. Look for a tool that offers simple time zone switching and automatic event time adjustment so you can plan and preview your schedule in other locations.
Personal connections around the world
DST creates inconsistencies in call and visit timings, making it harder to plan catch-ups with loved ones in different regions. Scheduling can be tricky even with friends or family in the same country, since DST changes can cause time zone differences between regions. You may be trying to find a good time for a catch-up phone call, or get on the same page for travel plans, caregiving needs, or social gatherings.
⏰ A calendar with automatic time zone detection ensures that everyone adds their availability and sees events in their own local time, easy to check with a current time zone indicator. And with simple time zone switching, you can check if a planned call time will work for friends and family in other places.
Online and global event timing
Planning online events for a global audience is already a challenge. You want to consider the varying time zones, and make sure there are good options for all regions. The DST transitions that happen in some areas add complexity. You might have found a workable schedule, but now you have to rethink all the start times. It is also very important to ensure schedules of global events are particpant-friendly without anyone getting stressed with time zone conversions.
⏰ Look for a calendar that gives you the options you for sharing events with a global audience: automatic time zone detection when you want event display to adjust to each viewer’s local time zone, and flexibility with a time zone link parameter to choose the time zone shown on embedded calendars.
Remote work coordination
Remote work across time zones becomes difficult when DST creates a mismatch in hours or creates scheduling confusion for ongoing meetings and regular events.
Because DST causes clocks to shift at different dates across the world, it’s important to specify the lead time zone when scheduling repeating events.
For example, consider a weekly recurring meeting. It always starts at 3pm Paris time, and Paris is set as the lead time zone. For team members in New York, the meeting will start at 9 AM most of the year, but at 10 AM for part of March and part of November. This is because New York usually starts DST earlier and ends later than Paris.
If the lead time zone for this meeting is set to New York, the event would always start at 9AM in New York. And for team members in Paris, the event will start at 3pm most of the year but at 2pm in part of March and part of November.
⏰ Not every calendar has the ability to set a manual lead time zone for recurring events. It’s also helpful to have simple time zone switching so you can manually check event times for other locations and colleagues around the world.
How to handle daylight saving time challenges
Despite the inconsistencies, confusion, and large number of petitions to stop the time switching, daylight saving time remains with us. Having good tools with built-in time zone management makes these DST changes much easier to handle.
Here are some of the most useful capabilities in calendars and scheduling tools to help you handle the DST challenges with ease.
Automatic time zone conversion
Teamup handles time zone conversion for events automatically. Create a meeting in your own time zone, and the event time will automatically adjust when viewed in other time zones. This automatic adjustment includes all the daylight saving time shifts around the world.
Lead time zone for recurring events
You have the option to manually select the lead time zone for each recurring event series. So if you’re coordinating meetings or events for a global team, you can accommodate the “home office” as the lead time zone even if you work from a different location.
You can also easily switch time zones without getting into the calendar settings or changing the defaults on your device.
Simple time zone switching
With simple time-zone switching, you can preview events in other time zones easily. For example, to set up a meeting with global colleagues, create the event in your time zone, then switch to other zones to ensure it’s a feasible start and end time for everyone.
Getting ready for a trip? Plug your travel times into Teamup, then switch to the destination time zone to see what your arrival time will be locally. Or, if you have the arrival and departure times relative to each time zone, quickly switch between the time zones to enter the information and get accurate info about the trip duration.
Automatic time zone detection
An embedded Teamup is great for sharing online events with a global audience. Set the calendar to detect the default time zone for the browser or device. Each person will be shown the event calendar in their own selected time zone, so no one gets the wrong information about events they want to attend.
See how Teamup helps this global community handle the time zone challenge.
Handling events across multiple time zones can be simpler and easier with Teamup. Give it a try with our time zone converter template or see the current time in cities around the world.
Current time zone visual indicator
In other calendars, like Google Calendar or Outlook, you can’t really tell which time zone you’re viewing by just looking at your calendar. For example, on Microsoft 365 Outlook calendar, you have to take several steps: right-click the calendar icon, select Options, and scroll to see the current time zone. There’s not an obvious way to see, right on your calendar, what time zone the events are being shown in.
Teamup is the only calendar with a visual indicator of the current selected time zone. It’s displayed in the bottom right on all 11 calendar views. Take a look at this calendar. The current time zone is easy to check in the bottom right corner:
Time zone link parameter
For even more flexibility in how you manage and display time zones, Teamup offers a time zone link parameter.
Here’s an example: Perhaps you want to share a calendar of events for a local audience. You want the events to always display in the local time zone, no matter who is viewing the calendar. You can embed the event calendar with a time zone link parameter to override automatic time zone detection and always display the events in the selected local time zone. It’s a helpful tool for sharing online events with different audiences around the world, or improving visibility of what’s happening in specific regions for a global organization.
Check out current time in cities around the world with time zone parameters set for each of the locations.
