Global time zones and UTC

Order Management supports localized time zones in Customer Service Center, Fulfillment Center, and Retail Center. A locale's time zone, as well as the format of the time and date are based on the locale set in Order Management or the time zone set in the user's profile.

Order Management supports Universal Time Code (UTC), also known as Coordinated Universal Time, because it's the primary time standard by which the world regulates clocks and time. Configuring the time zone for a locale is critical because time and date information is required in these cases:

Note: The locale and time zone is also configured in the Administration module when creating or changing a user account.

As of Release 4.1.13, UTC is the standard for new clients. For existing clients, Eastern Time is the standard. The Order Management user interface converts dates and times for display according to the selected user locale. If the AM or PM designation (or any offset) is omitted, then system (24-hour) UTC time is used. When accessing the database directly (via API calls or import/export files), you should be aware of the system time format.

Date Formats

The following are examples of date formats that appear in Order Management.

Country Date Format Examples
United States MM/DD/YY

MM/DD/YYYY

 02/10/16

02/10/2016
United Kingdom DD/MM/YYYY

YYYY-MM-DD

 10/02/2016

2016-02-10
France DD/MM/YYYY

DD-MM-YYYY

 10/02/2016

10-02-2016
Germany DD-MM-YY

DD-MM-YYYY

YYYY-MM-DD

 10-02-16

10-02-2016

2016-02-10
Austria DD.MM.YY

DD.MM.YYYY

 10.02.16

10.02.2016
China

YYYY-MM-DD

YYYY年MM月DD日.		 2016年2月10日.
Note: The international format for time is HH:MM:SS.

Scenarios

Scenario: Order Management in UTC but appears in the locale of the user account
On Monday, a customer in New York City calls to place an order. The Customer Service Representative (CSR), who was in Los Angeles, California, needs to create the customer's order and submit it to Order Management.
Action

The CSR performs these steps:

  1. Create the customer's order,
  2. Add items to the cart.
  3. Select the payment and shipping methods.
  4. Submit the order in Order Management, which saves the order in UTC. (The date is also saved in UTC.)

Order Management then converts the UTC as follows:

  • For the CSR who is viewing the order in Customer Service Center, the date and time appear in Pacific Daylight Time, which is the selected user locale.
  • For the customer, who will receive documentation such as the email confirmation or shipping information, the date and time appear in EST, which is the locale of the customer.
Scenario: Customer Service Center
On Monday, a U.S. customer calls to purchase and ship an item as a gift to an address in Paris, France, but only if it can arrive on Wednesday. The time zone that appears for the CSR is based on their base locale or locale set in the user profile. The U.S.-based CSR decides to change their user profile to the locale in France, with the corresponding time zone of Paris to ensure two-day delivery.
Action
The CSR performs these steps to confirm that the order is shipped on time to France, considering the different time zones:
  1. Log into Customer Service Center using the user profile, which is localized in English.
  2. Click Home.
  3. On the Home page, click Profile to change the user profile to the locale and time zone in Paris, France.
  4. Click Find Customer to search for and locate the customer.
  5. In the Address Book panel, click Add.
  6. Select France from the Country list for the shipping address, which then changes the address fields into the French address format.
  7. Enter the address using the address format for France and click Save.
  8. Begin the order process steps by adding product items from the Cart tab as described in Creating New Sales Orders in Customer Service Center.
  9. Click the Shipping tab and determine the best delivery method available to reach Paris in 2 days based on the time zone on the order.
  10. Continue the order process using the Shipping, Payment, and Review tabs and click Submit to complete the order.

Scenario: Customer Service Center, Fulfillment Center, and Retail Center
A CSR in Boston, MA needs to always view the date and time for any record in their localized time zone. When the CSR creates a user profile with a specific locale and time zone, all customer orders display that time zone, even if the order was created in another locale with a different time zone.

Action
The CSR performs these steps to view Customer Service Center in English with the corresponding East Coast U.S. time zone:
  1. Log into Customer Service Center using the user profile, which is localized in English.
  2. Click Home.
  3. On the Home page, click the Profile link in Customer Service Center, Fulfillment Center, or Retail Center.
  4. On the Edit Profile page, in the User Detail section, enter the first name, last name, and email address.
  5. Select English – United States from the Locale list.
  6. Select Eastern Time (US & Canada) from the Time Zone list.
  7. Click Update.

Related Links

Localization

© Copyright 2000-2023, Salesforce, Inc. All rights reserved. Various trademarks held by their respective owners.

 Show URL Submit FeedbackPrivacy Policy
X Privacy Update: We use cookies to make interactions with our websites and services easy and meaningful, to better understand how they are used. By continuing to use this site you are giving us your consent to do this. Privacy Policy.