I’ll be sure to reply to your message when I wade through my inbox upon my return. If your message is time-sensitive, please send an email to [Contact Name] at [contact email].
We have an office with a phone number and 4 people that work in it to specifically answer these inquiries.
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2) Hi. I’m thinking about what you’ve just sent me. Please wait by your PC for my response.
I’d just stick with “I will be OOO without access to phone or email from XX/YY to XX/YY, returning on XX/YY.” And then whatever directions for directing to your support/backup while you are out. I find that specifically saying ‘without access to phone or email’ sets a good expectation of non-response.
Here are four tips to help you create an effective after-hours voicemail greeting: 1. State your business name and hours of operation upfront. The first thing your callers should hear is the name of your business or organization. If they are calling when you are closed you should also be sure to let them know your standard business hours.
Much obliged to you for your email but our office will remain closed due to upcoming holidays. Unfortunately, due to this, we will not be able to send you an answer until 12-01-20XX. In case of emergency, you can send your queries to Ms. Medley at [website], she will answer all your queries. All delays are hereby regretted.
They only discovered this AFTER the Christmas rush. Thankfully there were no client meltdowns that year or it could have been a lot worse.
When one of my colleagues went on vacation, he sent an out-of-office message that was both clever and smart. First, he sent the recipient on an imaginary scavenger hunt to “the highest peak of the tallest mountain.” He used humorous absurdity to make it clear that he would not be checking email while he was away.
My absolute favorite was the one that literally said “hodilay”. Typo included, capitalization, or any other words, not.
Hi and thank you for your message. I’ll be out of the office on [DATE]. Please contact my manager, [EMAIL] for assistance.
In the digital age, most of us follow brands on social media. When a client follows a company on social media, it keeps them fresh in their mind and makes them more likely to do business with them. You can set an out-of-office to make it easy for a customer to connect, stay current, and maintain the brand loyalty that social media provides.
You may also want to include bullet points of what is in progress so that your client knows you’re on top of things. That will also likely reduce the amount of emails sitting in your inbox when you return. Unlike a more generalized email (like the one I’ve provided) that you can send en masse, you’ll want to set aside some time to send more personalized emails out.
We are having a temporary office move soon, and our head of facilities was delighted he didn’t need to find data ports for the phones as well as the PCs ;)
But what should you do to keep the message informative, engaged and maybe a little festive?
I absolutely hate this and it would definitely irritate me if received. I agree with the letter writer that it comes over as condescending and also a bit passive agressive in places. I’m definitely not the audience for this one! Presumably this is an internal only version and the company culture would find this cute / funny.
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”.
Note: You can also set different automatic out of office replies for different people. Just click the Rules… button in the bottom-left corner and add a rule for each person or email subject.