I might be your coworker. I don’t get a lot of calls so it slips my mind constantly. Email I just set up a timer and it’s so much easier that way.
I pretty much never pay attention to out of office replies, just note if there is one. If I really need something urgently I’ll look to see if there’s another person’s contact info, but it’s rarely that urgent. I might also look for a return date, if that matters to me. It would annoy me if I had to wade through a wall of text to find either of those things.
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If you have questions after reading the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) below, please contact your Human Resources consultant. Winter Break Schedule: FAQs
Vacation Tracker helped me book some days off, so you will not be able to reach me until *date*! I will be busy surfing the waves in Portugal/ climbing Kilimanjaro/ taking pictures on the Great Wall of China/ exploring wildlife in Tanzania.
Former coworker: “I am out of the country from X until Y. Please do not email me during this time as last time I came back to about 250, and reading them all takes up a lot of the time I have left before I retire.” Some people thought that was funny. The director who received that in response to an all staff communication? Not so much. Coworker got a talking to by his manager when he got back to the UK.
Respected Customers. It is to inform you all that our head office which is situated in New Hampshire, street 345 will be closed due to the upcoming holiday season. During this period, I will not be able to respond to all your emails as I will be in the area where an internet facility would be unavailable as well as I am not taking my laptop with me. So, your queries will remain unanswered during this period. Moreover, there would be seven days off from 1-01-2020 to 07-01-2020. Hope to see you all in the office on 08-01-2020. Wish you the best holidays!
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Before you put your coworker’s email address on your out-of-office message, get their approval and discuss a plan for handling requests and passing responsibilities back when you return.
The office is closed today for the Public Holiday. We will resume normal office hours from tomorrow morning. Enjoy your day off!
Our office will remain closed from [date] to [date] for the New Year celebrations. We assure you that all your emails will be responded as soon as we are back to the office. Happy New Year!
Amanda works at HubSpot, and she came with a unique auto respondent that asked her contacts to guess where she is. To give background, she flew down to Boston to attend a Red Sox training game in the spring with her father. She chose to ask her contacts whether where they think she might be, and also this played some wonderful use of litotes here:
The incensed people also tended to be the type to submit things at the very last minute or want an immediate answer that could’ve been solved via google.
I’ll reply to your message promptly when I return. But, if you require immediate assistance, please send an email to [contact name] at [contact email] in my absence.
Alternatively, some people will check their email while on vacation. Then, the text should indicate how often people may expect their email to be seen and acted upon.
And if you suspect that you won’t look through all those emails that cluttered up your inbox while you were on a vacation at all? Be honest about it and tell your prospects to contact you again at a certain date.
I physically recoiled at the thought of my face appearing on a new browser tab. UGH. The pets do say who their humans are (usually just first name) and what the pet’s favourite things are. My phone is now filled with memes and photos of my monitor as I send pet photos to friends.
I get really annoyed at people that don’t have put up OOO messages and I am left wondering if they are out or just ignoring me. I collaborated with a woman who was out frequently but never put an OOO. She also got very prickly if she felt you were going around her. So anytime we didn’t get a response from her, we had to go through this guessing game of “do we wait, do we talk to someone else, how important is our request.” I was glad when she moved on.