How to emulate the Out of Office Assistant in Microsoft Outlook

Original KB number:   311107

Summary

The Out of Office Assistant feature in Microsoft Outlook is a Microsoft Exchange Server service. It is available only when the Exchange Server transport service is included in an Outlook user's profile. You can emulate this feature by creating an e-mail template and defining a rule in the Rules Wizard to automatically reply with the template.

Note

Microsoft has confirmed there is no working process to achieve these end results for Microsoft Office Outlook 2007.

How to define an automatic reply template

Microsoft Office Outlook 2010 and later versions

  1. Select New E-Mail on the Ribbon.
  2. On the Format Text tab, select Plain Text.
  3. Type the information that you want to have in your reply message.
  4. Select File on the Ribbon, and then select Save As.
  5. In the Save As dialog box, select Outlook Template in the Save as type list.
  6. Type a name for your reply template in the File name box, and then select Save.

Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 and earlier versions of Outlook

Note

To complete these steps, do not use Microsoft Word as your e-mail editor. If Microsoft Word is currently set to be your default email editor, you will need to turn that off. Otherwise, the Outlook Template option will not be visible in step 4. After you complete step 5, you may return Word back to being your default email editor.

  1. Open a new Outlook message formatted as plain text.
  2. Type the information that you want to have in your reply message.
  3. On the File menu, select Save As.
  4. In the Save As dialog box, select the Outlook Template check box in the Save As Type list.
  5. Type a name for your reply template in the File Name box, and then select Save.

How to define a rule to send an automatic reply

Office Outlook 2010 and later versions

  1. Select the File tab in the Ribbon, and then select the Info tab on the menu.
  2. Select Manage Rules & Alerts, and then select the New Rule button on the E-mail Rules tab.
  3. In the Rules Wizard under Start from a blank rule, select Apply rule on messages I receive, and then select Next.
  4. Under Which condition(s) do you want to check, select the Sent Only To Me check box or any other check box that you want, and then select Next.
  5. Under What do you want to do with the message, select the Reply using a specific template check box.
  6. Under Step 2: Edit the Rule Description, select the underlined phrase a specific template.
  7. In the Select A Reply Template dialog box, select the template that you saved in step 6 of the How to define an automatic reply template section, and then select Open.
  8. Complete the Rules Wizard instructions, select Finish, and then select OK.

Office Outlook 2003

  1. On the Tools menu, select Rules and Alerts.
  2. In the Rules and Alerts dialog box, select the New Rule button on the E-mail Rules tab.
  3. In the Rules Wizard, select the Start from a blank rule button, select Check messages when they arrive, and then select Next.
  4. Under Which condition(s) do you want to check?, select the Sent Only To Me check box or any other check box that you want, and then select Next.
  5. Under What do you want to do with the message?, select the Reply using a specific template check box.
  6. On the Step 2: Edit the Rule Description page of the wizard, select the underlined phrase a specific template.
  7. In the Select A Reply Template dialog box, select the template that you saved in step 5 of the How to define an automatic reply template section, and then select Open.
  8. Complete the Rules Wizard instructions, select Finish, and then select OK.

Outlook 2002, in Outlook 2000, and in Outlook 98

  1. On the Tools menu, select Rules Wizard.
  2. In the Rules Wizard dialog box, select New.
  3. Under Which type of rule do you want to create?, select Start from a blank rule, select Check messages when they arrive, and then select Next.
  4. Under Which condition(s) do you want to check?, select the Sent Only To Me check box or any other criteria that you want, and then select Next.
  5. Under What do you want to do with the message?, select the Reply using a specific template check box.
  6. Under Rule Description, select the underlined phrase, a specific template.
  7. In the Select A Reply Template dialog box, select the template that you saved in step 5 of the How to define an automatic reply template section and then select Open.
  8. Complete the Rule Wizard instructions, select Finish, and then select OK.

The Rules Wizard rule to reply using a specific template is designed to send the reply only one time to each sender during a session. This prevents Outlook from sending repetitive replies to a sender from whom you receive multiple messages.

During a session, Outlook remembers the list of users to whom it has responded. When you restart Outlook, this list is deleted and the rule is reset to start again for each sender.

Note

Outlook must be running for the Rules Wizard to automatically reply. Additionally, Outlook 2007 must be running and configured to check periodically for new messages.