Don’t stress about what to say in your out-of-office messages. Keep it simple, concise, and the people reaching out to you will know exactly what to do or when they’ll hear from you. And, most importantly, enjoy your time off! By Erin Ollila / May 16th, 2021 / Categories: Professional Development / Tags: holidays, out-of-office, time off, vacation, work, work from home, work life balance
Thank you for your email! I am on vacation. Vacations are not for checking email, so I won’t be doing that. Fortunately, we rarely encounter life and death situations in the world of [INDUSTRY TYPE], and aren’t we all glad for that? If you think I’m checking email because you just received an email from me, that is only because I figured out the pixies that send emails on a schedule. Really, I’m not checking email.
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I thought this was great. It addressed the fact that when people call, it might be something that doesn’t need immediate attention, it could be important, or it could be critical. And it did it in a humorous way.
I came across a woman’s Maternity Leave OOO message which said “All emails will be deleted upon my return. If it still urgent after (return date), send another message.”
Who talks like that? A blowhard, that’s who… I promise, gentle customer, you won’t hear garbage like that from me. I’ll tell you why I like Aviation… Because it tastes like somebody finally made a gin for everyone.
I didn’t like it either. The implication seems be be that the person can’t trust their colleagues to know what to do if they are not around.
Pro tip: The first works well for both voicemail greetings and email responders, while the next two are most appropriate for emails.
Setting an auto-response email is probably not the first thing on our mind before we jet off on holiday. But if we don’t do it, we risk eroding the trust between ourselves and our customers. It’s important to remember that response time is a non-verbal sign that shows clients and business partners how responsible and professional a company is.
The only thing I add to that boilerplate is if I’m working but mostly unavailable.
You should use your out of office email whenever you’re going to be away from the office – whether it’s for a day, a week, or even longer.
If your message is urgent, fear not — we’ll get it addressed. Try doing one of two things: Send me an email at [email protected]. Just kidding. That’s not a real email address. Reach out to my manager at [email protected] in my absence.
For all pressing matters, please contact [Contact Name] at [contact email] for assistance.
Our office VM sends an audio file to our email. I love it, because I can apply all the filing and prioritization functions of my email inbox to the voice messages. It’s the only way I ever check my VM. I don’t even remember how to listen to messages on my phone.
Thank you for your email. I am out of the office for maternity leave until ( the date you expect to return from maternity leave).
You don’t need to turn off the “Driving” mode to make outgoing calls. And you can still access emails and messages as usual. The auto-reply will work as long as your phone in driving mode.
Professionally, I just try to be as boring as humanly possible, except in comments embedded in code.
Former boss used to put an OOO for EVERYTHING. Like, “I’m doing interviews today and will reply tomorrow.” Nothing was ever on fire so it could have indeed waited until tomorrow without the OOO – people probably wouldn’t have noticed.