How to Craft an Effective Out of the Office Message

We assume you have completed every task on your to-do list and cleared your inbox. Now, before you officially leave work for a long time, no matter whether you are going for a long weekend or any other significant family function, there’s one more important thing to be done: Create and activate a simple out of office message for your emails.

If your finalized out of the office message (OOO Message)  is incomplete or unclear, or you don’t bother to create one, it can create problems for you while you’re out — and when you come back.

Let us understand things with an example. If you don’t share the specific dates, you’ll not be available, and your colleagues and clients will send you multiple emails, filling your inbox and making it more difficult for you to handle the situation when you’re back. And if you don’t share your contact information for colleagues covering for you in your absence, you could unintentionally spoil ongoing projects at the company or leave your clients unsupported.

So, how to create a compelling out of office email message? Here are some of the tips for crafting a compelling out of the office message:

What to add in your out-of-office message

An effective out of office reply includes the following sections:

• Exact date — If you use the out-of-office message you used last time, then make sure to change the time and date with new dates and cross-check that all other important information in the message is updated.
• Reason for your absence — You don’t need to give specific details about where you are going and why, but it’s supportive to note whether you’re taking personal or vacation time. IF you don’t let your colleagues, then they might still attempt to contact you.
• The people who can help while you’re out of the office — It is recommended to provide the names, phone numbers, and email addresses of other colleagues who will manage things for you when you are out of the office. Don’t forget to mention each person’s expertise area so that other colleagues and clients know where they have to contact for any assistance.

Things to avoid in an out-of-office message

When you are writing and activating your best out of office message, you must avoid these downsides:

• Being funny — Avoid making jokes in your out-of-office message. Don’t indicate in the out-of-office message that you are happy to be out of the office or show them that you are going for fun and your coworkers aren’t. It is the best practice to keep your out-of-office message short, simple, clear, and professional.
• Promising a colleague’s instant help — When you are going out of the office, then you can’t know how quickly your teammates will be available and respond to emails in your absence, so don’t promise their instant support as well as you must ask your colleagues for permission before you share their phone number or email address in your out of office message.
• Telling people that you’ll reply instantly when you return — When you come back and join the office, you will have lots of tasks to complete, so avoid promising you’ll reply to all emails in a particular time frame. You don’t need to make a promise that you might have to break.

Out of office message examples

So, how a well-composed out-of-office message should look like? Here we are sharing some of the best templates for the professional out of office message for you. We hope you will like these out of office message templates:

• “I will be away from August 17-22. For urgent matters, you can contact my colleague, colleague Name, at [email and phone number].”
• “Thanks for your email. I’ll be out of the office Oct. 15-20. If you need assistance while I’m away, please contact colleague Name at [email and phone number] for web development questions or colleague name at [email and phone number] for finance questions.”
• “Thank you for your email. I am out of the office at this time, and I am not checking email. I will not return until Aug. 20. If this is an urgent matter, please contact colleague name at [email and phone number]. Otherwise, I will respond to your email as soon as possible after my return.”

So, now you have learned, and you are confident that you can set up simple out of office message for one day and  out of office message for long holiday easily. Crafting out-of-office messages will help you to manage things properly and make your clients, business partners, and teammates happy.

So enjoy your trip without any hassles.