microsoft office assistant / How to use the Out of Office Assistant in Office Outlook 2003 and in Outlook 2002

How to use the Out of Office Assistant in Office Outlook 2003 and in Outlook 2002



Applies to: Outlook 2016Outlook 2013Microsoft Outlook 2010 More

Summary
This article describes how to use "Automatic Responses (Out of Office)" and the "Out of Office Assistant."

Note This feature is only available with an Exchange account that many organizations use. Home users usually do not have an Exchange account. To enable the Automatic responses feature in a non-Exchange account, go to this section: How to enable automatic responses in a non-Exchange account.

How to activate "Automatic responses (Out of office)" or the "Out of office assistant"
For Microsoft Office Outlook 2016, 2013 and 2010
Click on the File tab and then on the Information tab of the menu.

1. Click on the file tab, and then click on the information tab, in the menu.

Click Automatic Answers (Outside Office).

2. Click on automatic responses (outside the office).
Note If you do not see this option, you are not using an Exchange account. Go to this section: How to enable Automatic responses in a non-Exchange account.
In the Automatic responses dialog box, select the Send automatic replies check box.
If you want to specify a date and time range, check the Send only box during this time interval. Then, set the Start Time and select the End Time.
On the Inside my organization tab, type the message you want to send within your organization and, on the Out of my organization tab, type the message you want to send outside of your organization.
Click on OK
If you selected the "Send only during this time interval" option in step 4, the Automatic responses (Out of office) feature will continue running until you reach the date and time set in End time in step 5.
Otherwise, it will continue running until you repeat step 1 and select the option "Do not send automatic replies".

In Microsoft Office Outlook 2007

In Microsoft Office Outlook 2003




How to enable automatic responses in a non-Exchange account.


The "Automatic responses (Out of Office)" or "Out of Office Assistant" feature is not available in non-Exchange accounts, such as Outlook.com (formerly Hotmail), POP3, or IMAP.

However, you can combine an Outlook email template with Outlook rules to simulate the functionality of the "Automatic responses (Out of Office)" feature. For more information, see the following articles:
Outlook 2013: Automatically reply to email messages without using an Exchange Server account
Outlook 2010: send out-of-office notices with POP3, IMAP and Outlook.com accounts
Outlook 2007 or Outlook 2003: send out-of-office notices with POP3, IMAP and Outlook.com accounts


More information
How to determine if you are using an Exchange account
For Outlook 2016, Outlook 2013, Outlook 2010 and Outlook 2007

In Outlook, check the status bar. If you are using an Exchange account, the status bar shows "Connected to Microsoft Exchange."
In Outlook, check the status bar. If you are using an Exchange account, the status bar shows


In Outlook 2003

On the Tools menu, click E-mail Accounts, click View or change existing e-mail accounts, and then check the type of account you are using.