Hi, I’m out of the office. Thank you for getting in touch. We’ll get back to you within 8 business hours.
Huh. This is a rare column from you that I disagree with almost entirely. I guess to start with what I think you get right, there's no need to apologize for being out of office, and no one should feel obligated to deal with anything other than a legitimate emergency (which are, in most fields, truly rare) while on vacation or while taking time off.
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You know that I am in habit of giving you a quick reply but this time I am facing difficulty due to the reason that I have to go to attend an annual session which is mandatory for my efficient official working. Therefore, I cannot reply to you on time. I hereby submit my apology for that. After I come back from attending the session, I will respond to all of your emails within a few days, most probably I will join you on 6-01-20XX.
The kicker is that they all get back on August 1st and are mad that their projects haven’t moved forward.
But this absence of basic travel cybersecurity is a problem. Email is the number one threat vector for socially engineered attacks. An automatic reply message not only sends the information to designated contacts, but it also bounces back to people who send phishing emails. Threat actors use any details found in OOO messages to craft targeted social engineering messages. Well-targeted messages build trust that threat actors take advantage of.
Protocol for when you should use an out-of-office message will vary by job and industry, but generally, you should set an OOO message when you’ll be out for two or more days.
I am not able to set OOO messages at all. Most of the people who are contacting me do so through custom aliases that then come to our team, who each handles specifics. Even if I’m out someone else is available, but I can’t know who is supposed to handle that specific email to be able to redirect without naming everyone, and then confusing things more when Client A gets the same reply as Client B but one needs to go to teammate C and the other to teammates D & E. Then to make just that bit more complicated, there are the clients who think that going around the system to email the teammates directly at our personal email addresses is better but pitch a hissy when we’re OOO but they didn’t get a notice? I just set rules to forward those.
Of course, managing a minute and a half response time isn’t so easily accomplished when you’re out of office, receiving hundreds of texts each hour, or shifting your attention to a different project.
Our senior leadership has admitted to not checking voicemails since we started working remotely…almost 15 months ago. It made me feel so good. I hate voicemail.
Yup, it’s that time of the year again where everyone’s slipping into the holiday mood 🎄🎁
While you’re writing and activating your out of office message, avoid including the following:
If you work in an industry (like PR, for example) where clients expect a response in a matter of moments or hours, you may need to set an out-of-office message if you’re absent for an afternoon. If you’re not sure whether you should set one, ask your boss or a coworker or consult your employee handbook.
It’s a reminder to you that you should be disconnecting, Smith says, whether it’s to recharge during your staycation or to focus on a family emergency. And it can give you peace of mind to know you’ve communicated what’s needed for things to continue running smoothly in your absence.
I apologize in advance for any inconvenience that this may cause you, and I want you to know that I can help you rectify this if you contact me on the email or phone number below.
PS: We love our downtime and here at HAR, we're big believers everyone needs a vacay from work. Yes, even you—the social media junkies, the workaholics, the entrepreneurial diehards who accidentally (or "accidentally") take their smartphone into the shower.
Oh gosh. You’ve just reminded me that I was supposed to change my VM before every vacation or holiday at my old job. Something I completely forgot to do after the first year. Whoops!
My favorite one that I’ve heard is from TV. “You’ve reached {name}. I can’t answer. Don’t waste my time.”