# Challenges with the \`schedule\` table for organizations in the USA

**URL:** <https://forum.openreferral.org/t/challenges-with-the-schedule-table-for-organizations-in-the-usa/429>\
**Category:** Technical\
**Tags:** datastructure\
**Created:** [September 14, 2023, 12:35am UTC](https://forum.openreferral.org/t/challenges-with-the-schedule-table-for-organizations-in-the-usa/429 "2023-09-14T00:35:30Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 15

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**Author:** ![mrshll](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/57b2e6/32.png) [@mrshll](https://forum.openreferral.org/u/mrshll)\
**Post date:** [April 29, 2026, 2:04pm UTC](https://forum.openreferral.org/t/challenges-with-the-schedule-table-for-organizations-in-the-usa/429/15 "2026-04-29T14:04:50Z")

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Hey folks,

Skyler and I have produced a formal proposal which we plan to put to the committee at the next meeting.

- [Schedule Groups and Events](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1AObnPSDJATA_kgWSeR4dd67fdxs_AG2hV1oLwjSNmWQ/edit?tab=t.0#heading=h.ye0dggmm63xe)

The full technical details of the proposal are contained in that document. In summary, the proposal does the following:

- Adds two new fields to the `service` object: `service.events` and `service.opening_hours`. These both consist of lists/arrays of schedules, but have specific semantics. As a result of this, the `service.schedules` field will be deprecated (i.e. data using it is still valid, but we recommend you use one of the other fields instead).
- Adds some fields to the `schedule` object which make it a bit friendlier to use.
  - `schedule.group` acts as a label to group different schedule objects together so that you know they belong together (e.g. to differentiate Week and Weekend schedules across “normal” hours and “holiday” hours whereas before you could accidentally pair a Normal Weekday schedule with a Holiday Weekend schedule).
  - `schedule.shortcode` will be able to contain a value from a codelist/enumerated list representing some common values for schedules e.g. `9-to-5`.

This doesn’t replace the need to rethink how schedules work for future MAJOR versions. The thinking that Skyler has done here is invaluable and we’ll be capturing it for future iterating.

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_[View the full topic](https://forum.openreferral.org/t/challenges-with-the-schedule-table-for-organizations-in-the-usa/429)._