The End of the Out-of-Office Response

It used to be moderately annoying. You sent someone an email for some wildly important reason and were excited beyond belief to see an immediate response, “Re: Wildly Important Email.”

“Great!” You exclaimed to yourself. “An immediate response!”

Then, you opened the email to see something akin to, “I am out of the office, returning 7/16. If your matter is urgent, please contact (insert name and number of some doofus you’ve never heard of).”

At that point, you knew your wildly important matter was dead, as you would never remember to follow up with this person on the 16th, and this person would never see your email in the overwhelming wad of electronic drivel awaiting his or her return from vacation.

This was compounded if you replied all to the 13 other idiots on your men’s-league hockey team, four of whom were on vacation. Not only did you get the brief feeling of moronic joy, knowing your email was hilarious enough to incite multiple responses, but you also realize the only four guys who would’ve cared what you had to say were the ones on vacation. Thus, you killed the entire email thread and became a worthless scumbag.

A New Kind of Annoyance

For all the reasons I loathe alleged smart phones and the inconsiderate drones who spend every second staring at those fancy little screens, the phones are doing something else: killing the out-of-office response. Or, more specifically, making those responses annoying for an entirely new reason.

Now, you send a wildly important email to someone and get the instant out-of-office reply. You go through the entire process babbled about above. Then, just as you complete the realization your wildly important matter will never see any attention, you get another reply from your target.

This second reply is a real reply, as this person who previously and automatically claimed to be out of the office is now sending you a sloppily typed concoction of words as if he’s never been out of the office in his life. There may even be a line at the end: “Sent from my phone. Please excuse any errors.”

Now, you’re confused. Is he in or out of the office? Would further communication from you be an insult? Do you have to say, “Sorry to bother you” if you do choose to communicate further? And why are his errors suddenly excusable? All the while, he’s undoubtedly ignoring whatever real human he’s near so he can type to you on his stupid phone.

Meaningless Replies

The out-of-office response is a lie. If you’re not available, and if I’m supposed to contact some cohort for urgent matters, why are you responding to me within two minutes? Furthermore, why are you responding to me while you’re out of the office? Pick one. Leave me alone after your auto response or don’t schedule an auto response and pay attention to me. Be in the office or don’t.