On Mon, 10 Aug 2026 at 21:41, Debbie Goldsmith via tz <[email protected]> wrote:
> Claro in Chile has shared us the decree 98, which stipulates the change of > time zone from September 2026 to April 2029. In particular, the next change > will be made on the night of Saturday, September 5, where the time zone > will change to UTC-3 for mainland Chile and to UTC-5 for island Chile > (Easter Island and Salas and Gómez Island). > > At first glance, this appears to already be reflected correctly in our data. Rather than declaring a fixed rule for DST transitions, Chile has recently tended to operationalize its DST dates three or four years at a time, which this decree does for the period from September 2026 through April 2029. Item 18 in the list of considerations refers to "maintain[ing] the regime of advancing the official time…under the terms set forth in the operative part of this decree." The operative part, on page 4, specifies advancing the clocks from 24:00 on the first Saturday of September and returning to standard time from 24:00 on the first Sunday of April between September 2026 and April 2029, which is consistent with recent practice and therefore matches the long-term predictions we already have: Rule Chile 2019 max - Apr Sun>=2 3:00u 0 - Rule Chile 2023 max - Sep Sun>=2 4:00u 1:00 - The existing exceptions for Magallanes and Aysén regions, which observe UTC−3 year-round, are also maintained, as is discussed in Item 19. Worth noting that Items 15 and 17 report how "the Undersecretariat of Economy and Small Businesses advised allowing a period of at least twenty-four months for companies—especially those related to tourism—to adjust their operations in the event of a regulatory change to the timekeeping scheme," which appears to have weighed heavily in the consideration toward maintaining the scheme as-is. -- Tim Parenti
