To save you time and help you strike the right tone, we built nine “Office closed for holidays” email templates for multiple scenarios. Customize these samples when needed. Choose the right tone. The appropriate tone depends on the holiday. Notice of Office Closure for Holiday for Whole Day/ Early Closing It is always advisable that the notice of any holiday, when the office will remain closed, should be given well in advance - so that no employee is put to inconvenience of coming to the office on a day when it is closed. A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z About US
I think the problem is that “at your earliest convenience” is a formulaic convention that uses explicit, almost exaggerated politeness to basically issue a stern direction, meaning “as soon as you possibly can”. When you turn it into “at my earliest convenience” it’s unclear if you mean “whenever it’s convenient for me to get to it” (what the words say) or “as soon as I possibly can” (what the meaning of the formulaic original is). Or else it sounds like you didn’t quite understand how “at your earliest convenience” works.
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Pro tip: The first works well for both voicemail greetings and email responders, while the next two are most appropriate for emails.
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.”
Duh. We're in the travel industry. Of course, an out of office message involving dolphin-speak would be at the top of our list! Who doesn't love a dolphin?
I’ll be back in front of my computer on [date] and will respond to your message at that time. If you need immediate assistance, please send an email to [contact name] at [contact email] so that the other elves in this workshop can help you out.
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).
Here’s one example out in the world, which jumpstarted me thinking about this topic:
When crafting an out-of-office reply, keep in mind that you must provide sufficient detail so that recipients understand exactly when you’ll not be able to respond.
Thank you for your email. I am out of the office for maternity leave until ( the date you expect to return from maternity leave).
Thank you for your email. Your message is important to (Us/Me) and (I/We) will respond as soon as possible.
I am currently out of the office on leave. Sales inquiries should be directed to Gabriela Cruz at 935.555.3455. Customer support matters should be directed to Miranda Trotman at 935.555.9001.
I say this as someone who used to have a chronic problem keeping up with my personal voicemails. But I got voicemail transcription set up so I can read them now, because just ignoring important phone calls has consequences. I can’t imagine trying to just duck them in a professional job where I had a phone number, and therefore an expectation that people can call me!
If this matter isn’t time-sensitive, rest assured that I’ll respond when I’m back from this break. But you can resend any messages that require my immediate attention with a subject line of “URGENT: [Original Subject].” Out of Office Template #6 For the Person Who Likes to Live on the Edge (of HR Protocol)
Respected Customers. It is to inform you all that our head office which is situated in New Hampshire, street 345 will be closed due to the upcoming holiday season. During this period, I will not be able to respond to all your emails as I will be in the area where an internet facility would be unavailable as well as I am not taking my laptop with me. So, your queries will remain unanswered during this period. Moreover, there would be seven days off from 1-01-2020 to 07-01-2020. Hope to see you all in the office on 08-01-2020. Wish you the best holidays!
It is not appropriate to say in the message that you will get back on the day you return from your vacation. You may have a lot of work to take care of on your first day after getting back; you don’t want to promise something you won’t be able to fulfil.
Otherwise, all hands will be back on deck upon my return on Thursday 5th September and I will reply to your email at the earliest convenience. The single biggest day of the year for calling in sick tends to fall during the festive period; more people were too ill to work on Monday 10 December than any other day last year. (Whosoff.com, 2019) December is the most popular month of the year for authorised absences, as many employees are using up their remaining holiday entitlement. (Whosoff.com, 2019)