So, for whatever reason you’re out of the office, your email inbox should be informative with any information about office closures or unexpected absences: Include an expected return date and time. Offer alternative point of contact and their details. Add the general office contact number and email address if you don’t have a specific point of contact. Be friendly and warm in your tone, even if you choose to keep it simple.
Over time I’ve pared my OOO messages down more and more to the absolutely essential. The main issue was whether to use first or third person. Either is fine, but it comes up because it’s nice to have the name of the OOO person in front of one’s eyes if one sends a lot of email and then finds stray OOO messages among the mail … “hmm, what was THIS one in response to…?”. – “I am absent the office today and will attend to your message by Monday, August 17.” – “I am traveling during the week of Monday, July 1 and may be unable to respond to your message immediately. For issues concerning the [operational project in remote area], please contact [co-worker]” – “Tamarack Fireweed is on leave from [date] to [date] with reduced access to email. Urgent messages can be routed as follows: For project X, please contact [person1]. For project Y please contact [person2]. For questions about [academic program] please write to [general alias]. “
.
An Out of office Message is the autoresponder feature within your email settings that allows you to automatically send a response when an email is sent to a specific email address. Typically, businesses will use the autoresponder feature to confirm receipt of an email and to acknowledge and thank customers for an order that may have been placed.
Your out of office message can link to testimonials from your happy clients. For those of us in travel, you could try something like:
Click the cog and select ‘Automatic replies’Select ‘Send automatic replies’Specify a time periodWrite your out of office emailConfirm other details and press ‘OK’
To be honest, if it wasn’t for the bloody flashing red light I’d never bother with it. Can’t stand the flashing light.
This is one reason I rarely give a contact person. My company is terrible at communication, and not only could you easily be sent on a OOO chain, you could also be emailing someone who is out who didn’t even use OOO.
Our store will be closed until the end of the week for [Thanksgiving/Christmas/New Year]. We are happy to inform you that all of your emails will be answered once we are back on [date].
Too long to read? Enter your email to download this post as a PDF. We will also send you our best business tips every 2 weeks in our newsletter. You can unsubscribe anytime.
Also, IMO, it’s putting the burden of knowing and managing your schedule on the other person. You expect them to be paying enough attention to you to remember when you come back and to resend their request. That’s not reasonable.
My employer uses Outlook and it has an option to display all OOO messages when you add the person into the To/CC/BCC fields of an email, prior to sending it. It’s pretty great and actually saves an email sometimes because I can see who I should contact and just go to them.
This person works remotely and wants to continue to do so, but I think I am going to have to have a conversation about them using the technologies at our disposal that make this possible. Including out of office and second take-home monitor.
Tested to/from 2 iPhones (1 personal/1 work phone) and neither of them receive the designated Auto Reply Text. What am I doing wrong?
Thanks for your email. I’m currently attending [insert event, conference etc here], and will return on [date of return].
Hi, Our store will be closed until the end of the week for Thanksgiving/Christmas/New Year]. We are happy to inform you that all of your emails will be answered once we are back on [date]. Kind regards.
But despite these (fantastic) suggestions, the number one rule for choosing your out of office is that it reflects who you are as a person. Don’t change for anyone, especially not your auto-responder.
Note: For Outlook 2007, to turn off out-of-office replies, select Tools > Out of Office Assistant and uncheck the Send Out of Office auto-replies checkbox. Find more information on automatic replies at https://support.office.com/en-us/article/send-automatic-out-of-office-replies-from-outlook-9742f476-5348-4f9f-997f-5e208513bd67. Was this answer helpful? Yes No How to fix a compromised (hacked) Microsoft Office 365 account One of the most common security support requests we receive from our Office 365 customers is... Office 365 Pop/IMAP Settings