csv import – wrong times / timezone

[wdburgdorf]

I just exported data from a Google calendar and am now trying to import the data. Everything is correct in the csv, and all is fine after import. Only all of the times are off by one hour. Time zone seems to be set and detected correctly both in the csv as on the site and in Events Calendar. Still, they appear wrong in EC.

There is only one timezone, CET in all places.

How can I make it right?

[wdburgdorf]

I looked closer and found that during summer time, times are off by two hours. Apparently the import ignores the timezone info in the csv and assumes GMT for all times.

In the csv, it looks like this:
“16.03.2018 19:00 CET”
“07.06.2018 23:00 CEST”

[wdburgdorf]

… no it doesn’t. It just ignores all settings and always sets the same wrong times.

[Brendan]

Hey there,

Welcome to our premium support forums! The first step here is to review our Testing for conflicts guide and reply back with your findings. It would also help if you included the iCal link(s) you’re having troubles with and I’d be happy to try and reproduce the issue. Please include screenshots of your WP and Events Calendar timezone settings.

Rest assured, we will get to the bottom of your issue. Have a great evening and thanks for choosing us for your events calendar & ticketing needs. Cheers ?

Brendan

[wdburgdorf]

Hi Brendan, Thanks for your reply.

It has nothing to do with conflicts. And there is no iCal link. I exported an ics from Google Calendar and converted it to csv. And then I had a very hard time importing it correctly – your import feature really deserves improvements.

Eventually I found a workaround: I removed all timezone references from the csv. So instead of “16.03.2018 19:00 CET” it is now just “16.03.2018 19:00”. Apparently the import cannot handle timezones at all. Now times are just imported as they are – works for me, fortunately, because all of my times in this file are in the same timezone.

Another problem were full day events. Import would not recognize these and just used “00:00” as times. Eventually I figured out (checking inside the database) that the full day flag is stored in the field EventAllDay and needs values of yes or no, so I manually added those to my csv. Now I’ve got everything imported correctly – a lot of work and many tries.

It would all be much easier, if The Events Calendar had an export feature. Then we could simply check what comes out and assume that import needs the same data and formats. I see no export in the backend, and in the frontend there is just the ics export, which does not work at all. If you fix that, it would help a lot.

What the frontend export currently does, is saving the whole page content, but no events.

Otherwise I like the Events Calendar Pro a lot, just annoyed be the wasted import issues time …

[Brendan]

Hi there,

I see your point and that is a great suggestion for the export feature for the backend. I will bring this up in our next dev meeting.

Thanks,
Brendan

[Support Droid]

Hey there! This thread has been pretty quiet for the last three weeks, so we’re going to go ahead and close it to avoid confusion with other topics. If you’re still looking for help with this, please do open a new thread, reference this one and we’d be more than happy to continue the conversation over there.

Thanks so much!
The Events Calendar Support Team

[Author]

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