John Whatsisname has retired. Please contact [insert name and email] for enquiries relating to [subjects], or myself at [email] for personal matters. Thank you to my colleagues and clients for your support over the years.
Save time and direct folks to a page with answers to frequently asked questions in an autoresponse to help sort and prioritize customer service inquiries. Thanks for reaching SimpleTexting, my name is Jenny. While you wait for a customer support rep, see if we can answer your question here https://txt.st/PQBLPE.
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1. Add your office closing dates to your email signature block a month in advance. Highlight it to make sure it stands out as your regular clients/customers probably don’t even look at your email signature anymore. 2. Add your office closing dates to your November/December invoices. Most clients/customers will thoroughly read an invoice to
Join us at the HAR Reception Tues., 6pm @ Ballroom B. If you need tickets, send me a text: 555.555.5555
But what if you’re only taking off one day? Sometimes, it might seem silly to bother with an out-of-office for such a short amount of time–especially if it’s a day that a lot of other people are taking off (such as a national holiday). If people do need you to get back to them urgently, they’ll think they’re being ignored. (Even if you define “urgently” differently.) And if there’s a chance of an emergency landing in your inbox, it’ll be that much harder for you to unplug because you’ll just keep “checking in.”
My department still doesn’t allow us to send OOO auto-replies to external recipients because of one incident years ago (a customer tried to contact a sales rep about an urgent order, got the rep’s auto-reply, and in their ensuing panic, somehow got escalated all the way up to the company president). Any external emails we get are auto-forwarded to a centralized mailbox and (ostensibly) handled by another rep while we are out. It bothers me to know that my external contacts won’t get a reponse from me while I’m out and may think I’m just ignoring them.
By now, your neighbourhood supermarket is probably already blasting the classic Christmas tunes, your favourite colleagues are on vacation many miles away, and you’re counting down the days till you get to clear your annual leave 😏
Because I used to get phone calls that defaulted to, “I need the director”, I had my out of office mail set to:
You don’t need to say how long you’ll be away, adds Tim Reeves, principal of the ad agency Allen & Gerritsen. “That just makes you feel guilty, particularly if you’re taking a glorious two-week vacation,” he says. “Just say when you’ll be back. It feels way better.”
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Oh, this reminds me of the best out of office I ever received. It was three years ago, but it was so funny I saved it. All of it was gold but the sign-off was “Hoping that you are at least a little bit jealous (why else should I go on vacations to begin with?), I remain truly Yours, etc”.
A professional voicemail greeting is a vital component of your communication strategy. It can increase engagement with your clients, create rapport and leave a good first impression when you're currently not available to pick up the phone. Knowing the perfect words to include in your professional voicemail recording increases the chances of
I worked at a public agency and would have different out-of-office messages for internal and external. I was chastised for having a “too informal” message- because the idiot talking to me didn’t realize me saying “I’ll be back next Tuesday for the big staff meeting” (or whatever) was just for co-workers and not the public. I told them but of course it didn’t matter. So from then on I always made sure to start my internal OOOs- “Hello Company X comrade…. blah.” So it was clear which was which. I am not able to respond to your email promptly because my husband died. I will not be accepting zoom invitations. Please do not respond by suggesting future alternative dates. I don’t know when I will be able to speak without crying.
Going beyond being formal and functional with your messages, you can also add a note of festive mood to your email if you feel like being creative. To this purpose, you can adopt a lighter tone, while referencing the holiday in question.
I will always assume it is an inability to interact in an adult fashion with the world of technology. There is no good reason to avoid voicemails so aggressively – those that are doing so should probably be seeking therapy to overcome their issues with technology and/or the human voice. A lot of us process text faster and more accurately than speech, especially poor-audio-quality speech recorded by someone who didn’t bother to leave all the relevant information. Most voice mails are bad.
I, in turn, will cheer you up with some sunny photos of this great place where I’m staying.
Not quite an OOO, but a former boss had an email signature that said she was doing field work so her email responses would be delayed.