The start and end dates on promotions allow a promotion to only be active within a certain date and time range.
Example use cases for using start/end dates:
1.Promotion is for a sales promotion for a certain period of time
This is the classic sales or catalogue type promotion often seen in retail type environments. Set the start date and end date range and, optionally, time (eg. sale starts 9:00am Saturday, till the end of the month, etc.). You may want to use promotion Type Price Level to limit this promotion to Retail customers.
2.Promotion is for a special bid or pricing contract
This is for a pricing contract where you have offered a list of stock at a specific price, or a given time period to a customer, list of customers, etc. For example, we agreed to sell you these stock items for this amount of time at this price. The Promotion Type in this use case depends on who this promotion is for. For example, if one or just a few customers, use Promotion Type CardFile, or if for a buying group use CardFile Group.
Further information:
Example Usage of Promotional Pricing