How Google Calendar Can Screw Up Appointments When Changing Timezones

By Michael Gray on August 20th, 2009
In Google

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While I don’t make my use of Google products like Google Apps and Google Reader secret it still continues to amuse some people when I do. However a few weeks ago when I went to SES San Jose, I encountered a new “feature” that occurs when you change time zones, and it didn’t do me any favors.

Before SES San Jose I got emails from Vanessa Zamora of WebmasterWorld and Abby Prince of Web Pro News to schedule some interviews, and I set them up for local time on the west coast. When I got to the west coast Google Calendar recognized this and asked me if I wanted to adjust my calendar, I said yes and it went and adjusted all my appointments. Since I wasn’t prepared for this I didn’t screen shot the behavior, however now that I’m back I did. Here’s a screen shot asking me if I want to change the time zones (note the time’s of the appointments)

Here’s the screen shot after the change to east coast time, notice the appointments moved

I only had a few appointments scheduled so it was easy to move stuff back to where it should be, but I don’t think this behavior is what any users want.
photo credit: Emma Rose Photos