Microsoft Outlook Webmail

for Internet Explorer

Working with the Out of Office Assistant

Outlook Webmail has an Out Of Office Assistant, which will send an automatic response to email when you are away. This response can be personalized, and will send only once to each person who emails you (no matter how many messages from the person you receive).

Turning On the Out of Office Assistant
Turning Off the Out of Office Assistant

Turning On the Out of Office Assistant

You can turn the Out of Office Assistant on indefinitely (until you choose to turn it off), or for a set span of time. In addition, you can customize messages for people within your organization and people outside of your organization. People outside of your organization can include both people you know and people sending you spam emails. To avoid validating your email address for spam emails, you can choose to send a response to people outside of your organization only if they are within your Contacts list.

On the toolbar, click OPTIONS
The Options screen appears.
From the Navigation pane, select Out of Office Assistant
The Out of Office Assistant options are displayed.
Select Send Out of Office auto-replies
OPTIONAL: To send automatic replies only for a set amount of time,
1. Select Send Out-of-Office auto-replies only during this time period
2. To select the time you would like to begin sending automatic replies, from the Start time pull-down lists, select the desired date and time
  OR
  In the Start time text boxes, type the desired time
3. To select the time you would like to stop sending automatic replies, from the End time pull-down lists, select the desired date and time
  OR
  In the End time text boxes, type the desired time
To create the automatic reply that will be sent to people within your organization, in the Send an auto-reply once to each sender inside my organization with the following message text box, type your message
To send an automatic reply to people outside of your organization,
1. Select Send Out of Office auto-replies to External Senders
  NOTE: This option is selected if a checkmark appears.
2. To send the reply only to people outside of your organization who are in your Contacts list, select Send Out of Office auto-replies only to senders in my Contacts list
  To send the reply to everyone from outside of your organization who emails you, select Send Out of Office auto-replies to anyone outside my organization
3. To create the automatic reply that will be sent to people outside of your organization, in the Send an auto-reply once to each sender outside my organization with the following message text box, type your message
Click SAVE
Your Out of Office message is now set.
To return to your mailbox, from the Navigation pane, click MAIL

Turning Off the Out of Office Assistant

When you return after an absence, it is important to turn off the Out of Office Assistant to be sure that you don't inadvertently keep informing people that you are away.

On the toolbar, click OPTIONS
The Options screen appears.
From the Navigation pane, select Out of Office Assistant
The Out of Office Assistant options are displayed.
Select Do not send Out of Office auto-replies
Click SAVE
Your Out of Office message is turned off.
To return to your mailbox, from the Navigation pane, click MAIL