I don’t think it’s condescending, but I do find it annoying. I have a coworker who sometimes writes emails in this tone of voice, and it’s honestly way too much.
I worked with a guy years ago who would update his voicemail greeting literally every time he left the office.
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I do think mine sometimes gets a little wordy because I generally have 2 to 3 people that I direct people to depending on need. But, I figure it’s less hassle than only going through one person and getting shuffled around.
I think the OOO you wrote in about is hysterically funny. I also think it would be out of place in a lot of offices (the board of directors that oversee my org would emphatically not think the message was funny).
Picking the right words for you holiday out-of-office emails can seem like a proper “task”, particularly if you want to be both clear and polite with your message, while sprinkling it with usual phrases about the spirit of holidays. Yet, leaving your customers without this type of message is a big no-no, as it presents you as an unprofessional & sloppy equivalent of the notorious Ebenezer Scrooge. Thus, you need to fire up your email client and announce your absence with style by sticking to the following templates and tips.
If those weren’t bad enough, if anyone on that lists sets up an out-of-office message, it *automatically* replies all. If the email bounces back, it bounces back reply all. One guy left the company and his email had a permanent out-of-office auto reply. The list was quite busy for a month or so and the message popped up multiple times a day.
Providing estimated time to customers for getting responses is the first and foremost best practice to be followed by businesses. Usually, when customers know what the wait duration is, they are not very frustrated. Hence, setting clear expectations is crucial for delivering excellent service.
I’m at Growth Marketing Conference – Are You? Bonjour from France! 🇫🇷Happy Holidays! I’m at home with my family.
In case of maternity leave, make sure that you set up a long-term out of office message.
I used to hire a lot (hundreds) of freelance writers who would each be given a deadline by which their particular project was due. As these were large projects, they typically would have several months to complete them. I soon discovered that a significant number of freelancers (at least 25% if I’m remembering correctly) would email a couple of days before their assignment was due to report the sad news that they would be missing their deadline because “someone close to [them] had just died”.
Same! If I’m on vacation then I say I have no access to emails. Even if I’m just sitting on my couch all week.
To help you write yours, here’s everything you need to know, along with a few out of office templates for you to choose from:
Honestly, what drives me crazy is after someone has emailed me, gets the out of office, then *does* email someone else instead of waiting for me to get back. Yet said someone doesn’t email me back to say “see you’re out, person X got it taken care of, you can disregard my email”. So then I waste time seeing the initial request and following up. Has anyone found a good wording / other solution to know if the request was completed by someone else?
A few years ago we had a team meeting, with the typical agenda provided to all by our manager. One of the items was OOO and the manager’s name and dates of her upcoming vacation–of course, to give the team advance notice that she would be out. One of my colleagues did not know the acronym and was at first confused. His read: “Ooooh, Mary is on vacation for these dates and is so excited.” Which I am sure was the case, but . . . no, not exactly. Ha ha.
It’s possible I might quote from some responses to this in an upcoming column, so please note if you don’t want me to do that with yours!
Seeing and experiencing destinations is how I keep on top of the trends and make on-the-ground connections for my clients. While I'm away, take a peek at how these connections helped me surprise Tina with an upgrade to a beachfront villa for her honeymoon [link to testimonial/video/FB post with Tina's thank you email and picture of the view].
Think about a soon-to-be-ex-colleague that really could do with some extra enquiries forwarded their way (call it 'paying it forward').