Vacation Message

Use a Vacation Message when you’re going to be out of the office for an extended period of time. You can enable automatic replies to your incoming email, and set a vacation message that inform senders that you’re away, and won’t be able to respond to your email. You may also wish to include additional information, such as when you’ll be back in the office, and who the sender can get in touch with for assistance while you’re gone.

When someone first sends you an email while your vacation message is active, they’ll receive an automatic reply containing your message. They won’t see an additional automatic message when they send additional email within the next 48 hours. After 48 hours, they’ll see an additional automatic message and the timer starts over again.

Configuration Steps

  1. Go to the W3C TAG Account server home page (https://account.w3ctag.org/) and sign in.

    Sign in

  2. Under My Account in the navigation bar on the left, click on Mail.

    View Your Mail Settings

  3. Click the Edit… button.

    “Edit” Button at Bottom-Right of Page

  4. in the Vacation message section, you can enable automatic replies to your incoming email, and set a vacation message that informs senders that you’re unable to respond to email, e.g.:

    I will be out of the office starting [start-date], returning [return-date]. If you need immediate assistance during my absence, please contact [contact-name] at [contact-email]. Otherwise I will respond to your email as soon as possible upon my return.

    or

    Thank you for your message. I will be mostly unavailable today as I recover from a cold. However, I plan to check my inbox and will respond to messages as I’m able.

    For urgent matters, please reach out to my colleague [contact-name] at [contact-email].

    or

    Thank you for your email. I’m currently completing a training seminar and will have minimal access to my inbox until [return-date]. If you have an urgent matter and need immediate assistance, please reach out to our customer service team at [phone-number].

    Automatic Reply Enabled with Vacation Message

    Note that there’s no ability to set a date range here. You must remember to manually disable the vacation message upon your return.

  5. Finally, save your changes by clicking OK.

    “OK” Button at Bottom-Right of Page