I once created a script for a website of mine that looks at who (which author) saves the page. Based on this information, a script ensures that the page that this author creates is automatically saved under his main (parent) page.

SCRIPT

function parentsetter_save_post()
{
    global $post;
    $custom_field = get_post_meta($post->ID,'provider_name',true);
    if ($custom_field!=''){
        $parent_page = get_page_by_title($custom_field);
        if (!empty($parent_page) and $post->post_parent!=$parent_page->ID){
            global $wpdb;
            $wpdb->query($wpdb->prepare("update $wpdb->posts set post_parent=%d 
            where ID=%d",$parent_page->ID,$post->ID));
        }
    }
}

add_action( 'wp_insert_post', 'parentsetter_save_post' );

However, after the publication of this page something strange happens with the permalink.

Example.

I am logged in as "Wesley" and if I save a page with the title "USB-Stick" the permalink should be as follows:

websiteurl/author-names/wesley/usb-stick/

But when I save the page the permalink is like this:

websiteurl/usb-stick/

When I try to go to this page I get a 404 because it doesnt exist.

The strange thing is that after 5/10 minutes the permalink is good and everything is fine.

But I get complains from everybody after publishing the page / post the link is not right and they get an 404.

Anybody has any idea how this happening and is there a way to solve this?