My dad will call and leave — legit — a 5 minute voice mail where he will tell me that he has something to tell me, that it is really funny, that he can’t leave it as a voicemail because I won’t get it, or maybe I won’t find it funny, that’s fine, I don’t have to call him back, it was stupid anyway, it probably isn’t funny….. He goes through all of the stages of passive aggressive behavior before ending with “Anyway, call me back.”
If you want your message to be formal, avoid using contracted forms such as I’m and I’ll as well as informal or casual language. It’s also a good idea to start your message with an expression of thanks like: If your audience isn’t from your work environment, you could take a risk with something more fun and personalised:
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Sorry I missed you. I’ll be out of the office and slow to respond until after the break. While I have you, though, help settle an argument among my colleagues and me: Die Hard 1: The Office Christmas Party Gone Wrong. Die Hard 2: Airport Conspiracy. Die Hard 3: Samuel L. Jackson. Enough said. Die Hard 4: Cyberthreat. Die Hard 5: You should probably not pick this one. Impossible! It’s like choosing a favorite child!
I think this was from some outside contractor: “I have decided to retire to Pluto. Please send all work related enquiries to Cecil.Mongoose at llamagroomers dot com, or if you prefer an intergalactic means of communication my personal address is fergus at pluto dot com.”
Please note: Shipment cutoff times on December 22nd will be at 2pm MST. Regular shipment schedules will continue on Tuesday, December 27th.
If you need immediate assistance with [project or department], please contact [name and contact information]. For assistance with [project or department], please contact [name and contact information].
I guess my first instinct might be thinking it’s rude but having seen it a few times I do get it. It really makes sense for people who get dozens or hundreds of emails a day and are gone for extended periods of time. It’s more courteous to be up front about it than silently delete like some people said they do (though I get they maybe just didn’t realize they’d need to do that).
While injecting a little humor into your vacation email message can sometimes be a good idea – depending on your company and contacts – avoid oversharing and keep it professional at all times.
When I’m out for a day or longer, I like to schedule my out of office message to run all the way up until the start time of my day when I return, since we have people who start emailing three hours or earlier before I even get to my desk. If it’s a Monday and I’ve been out for two weeks and they’re emailing me at 6:30am my time, I want people to know that I’ve been out and will be wading through my inbox and might not answer them right away at 10:01 their time like I typically would.
I used to work at a place where we would occasionally send reports of network misuse that sometimes included inappropriate images the user had stored on work devices. One person had an email system that was somehow set up to make any attached images the profile pic for that account. So she would end up with random pornographic images as the profile pic whenever she received reports from us. She said she had no idea how to change it and could we please help? Since she was not part of our company, and I have no idea how that could even happen, I just started sending her kitten pictures after every report that included an image. Problem solved.
You are hereby informed that a large number of our company workers are going to take their days off due to extreme weather conditions prevailing in the city. Due to this, there would be much difficulty in coming and going so it is a mutual decision from the heads of our office to make it closed from 25-12-20XX to 02-01-20XX. This temporary closure will result in delayed answers to your queries, so these will be answered right after the opening of our office. All the delays are regretted.
If you’re feeling stuck, try our free OOO email generator to draft a message that perfectly captures who you are and where you’re going. Out-of-Office Messages for Vacation 1. “I’ll email you back once I’ve defrosted.”
For immediate assistance, please contact me on my cell phone at 0912345678 or [email protected].
11) Thank you for your email. Your credit card has been charged $5.99 for the first ten words and $1.99 for each additional word in your message.
I agree! I’m in HR and all I can think of when I see funny OOO’s from people is, “How big of an a$$ are you going to feel when someone emails you about needing time off for a funeral and they get this nonsense back?”
A Christmas closure email is an email sent to the staff stating that the office, institution, etc. will be closed for the Christmas holidays. It can be one that a store will send to customers as well.
My OOO replies are relatively boring…usually state if I’m using PTO or at a conference, dates, who to bother in my place, etc.