Voice mail is a strictly worse medium than almost any alternative. You don’t get the opportunity to converse and ask questions back and forth like you do with a phone call; you can’t extract information efficiently from the message like you can with an email (the old “ugh, I have to listen to this entire message over again just to check one thing he said at the end” scenario).
Hello, All our stores will be closed until the end of the week for [Christmas]. We will respond to all your inquiries once we are back on [date]. Merry Christmas! Regards [Name/signature]
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Website: https://www.eou.edu/coronavirus/2020/03/24/march-24-2020-voicemail-and-phone-instructions-when-working-from-home/
The date range you're gone but more importantly . . . The day you will respond. (Pro tip: If you seriously get a ginormous volume of emails when you're away, or you're going to be gone for an extended amount of time, make sure this date is one or two days AFTER you're back from your vacation. Under promise, over deliver, do your laundry.) Alternate contact if there is an emergency. Your phone number (if you absolutely must, but I don't endorse this).
Yeah, announcing you were going to delete emails unread and expecting the sender to resend when you return would NEVER fly in my office. I’d get executive complaints about that, especially if it went to a client or outside party – if a client can’t reach you, they will reach out to someone else who may not work at your organization and you lose business. I feel like this delete-it-all philosophy would only work for an entirely internal role where timelines are more relaxed, and even then, I feel it’s a bit unprofessional to foist your own catch-up work onto others, especially if they’ve been backfilling for you while you were OOO.
Website: https://www.interimbusiness.com.au/7-ways-to-announce-your-holiday-office-closure-to-the-world/
At my old job we had a short script for our voice mail messages including whether we were in the office or out of the office. We were specifically told not to say why we were out of the office for personal privacy and protection reasons. However, an exception was soon made–for jury duty. Callers were getting freaked out when they got the message “I’m out of the office and don’t know when I will return.” They would be worried about the person they were calling and worried about whether or not they would be able to get the info they needed. So if on jury duty we would say, “I’m out of the office on jury duty and don’t know when I will return.”
I typically say “thanks for your message, I’m out until blah date, with periodic access to email” or no access depending. I list contacts who are willing to pitch in if necessary, and list the day AFTER my return that I’ll be able to address messages.
1. Out of Office and Limited Access to Email Example. [Greeting] Thank you for your email message. I am going to be out of the office and will be back at (Date of Your Return).
But I will be taking periodic breaks from eating, binge-watching, and probably from cooking, too, to check my email [once per day/every evening/occasionally] while I’m away.
You need to let colleagues, clients, and prospects know that you won’t be available, while ensuring that they know the best course of action to take while you’re away.
I do this because my industry’s norm is that people check their email on vacation, at least once or twice, but I don’t do it. I don’t have work email on my phone so it’s technically true.
I had coworkers (and people up my chain of command) that did/do this. The thing all those people had/have in common is that they came from the military. So I always took it as a military thing. Curious if that particular coworker had a military background.
Gotta go, my fingers are frostbitten. If you really need me, either get a shovel and dig me out of here, or reach out to my colleague Anna — who’s not frozen under snow with frostbitten fingers — at [email protected]
I’ll be 1 percent connected while on vacation so I’m not 100 percent panicked on return. Thank you for emailing me.
With these tips, you’ll be able to write your next auto-reply message, for holidays or other reasons.