The season of good cheer is upon us and you can feel the anticipation in the air. Most of us will be taking at least some vacation, and we all want to get the most out of our time away. So before you re-post your standard out-of-office reply, stop and ask yourself: will the way you’ve written the message really help you do just that?
If your auto reply messages give customers the ‘what next’ picture it will make customers feel that you as a brand can visualize their problem by putting in their shoes.
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I am currently on travel in Ethiopia. If you’d like to contact me, please write to me in Ethiopian (Amharic).
I’ll reply to your message promptly when I return. Should you require immediate assistance, please send an email to [contact name] at [contact email] in my absence.
The OOO definitely has those two pieces. But it could be 1 of 4 people who handle things when I’m out (depending on what it is) and they may not know at all that the requestor had reached out to me first / forget to cc me. So, I’d see this as me adding to my OOO “if you contact person X, please keep me cc’ed on the message you send to person x”?
I worked somewhere that required we use them when we left for the day or if we were in meetings all day. It was rather annoying to do every single day. Now I am not at a place that requires it thankfully. I will often put one up if I leave early or if I am arriving late. Also if I am actually out of the office I will also put one up.
If your request is urgent, there’s no use sitting idly in my inbox. So, please send your request to [contact name] at [contact email].
Rather than a number of days or vague phrasing like “this week,” giving exact dates helps prevent confusion and lets senders know when they can expect a response from you.
I guess it’s relatively minor, but I once emailed a local government official with a question about building permits (just as a citizen, not work-related) at about 10am on a Monday and got an out-of-office reply stating she’d be back “Monday” with no date. So I had no idea whether she was already back and hadn’t turned off the message yet, in which case, not urgent, I’ll wait, or was out for a week, in which case, I’d like to ask someone else. Not a big inconvenience, but it was so illogical not to give a date that it really drove me crazy
4. Sample Email Reply for Vacations with Phone Number. [Your Greeting] Thank you for your email. I am currently out of the office, and I do not have email access.
Hijacking this with a question- what do you do when you no longer have an co-workers to serve as an out of office contact? I find myself putting up the OOO less and less, because there’s no one left to respond to anything in my absence (beyond my supervisor who has no knowledge of how to do the tasks of my job).
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In a role where I got many OoO replies, I actually loved this. (And wrote back in said language. And got a reply!)
They only discovered this AFTER the Christmas rush. Thankfully there were no client meltdowns that year or it could have been a lot worse.
Here are some do's and don’ts for crafting an effective outgoing message, along with some out-of-office message examples: The exact dates of your time off — If you are simply reactivating the message you used during your last time away, make sure you change the dates, and double-check to ensure they’re right. The reason for your absence — Colleagues might still attempt to get in touch with you if they think you’ll be checking in. They’ll be less likely to try to contact you if they know you’re taking personal or vacation time. The people who can help while you’re out — Provide their names, phone numbers and email addresses. If you handle multiple areas, specify each person’s area of expertise so colleagues and clients know exactly where to go for assistance. What to avoid in automatic replies
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Yep, tech worker here and I didn’t even bat an eye at this when I saw it on TikTok.