Setting an auto-reply is a great way to manage your email when you are not able to check email and want those who sent an email to know not to expect a response right away. Imagine, you send an email to a potential employer and don’t hear back for several weeks. Your mind races, assuming the worst. Then you receive a response noting that the person to whom you sent the email has been out of the country. Wouldn’t it have been less stressful if you received an auto response to ease any stress?
In Gmail, the setting is called “vacation reply,” but you can use the feature anytime necessary. Will you be participating in an activity outside of law school and not be able to correspond via email most of the day? Set up a “vacation” reply (or auto-reply) and let folks know that you will be back in touch with them as soon as you’re able.
Set up your vacation reply
- On your computer, open Gmail.
- In the top right, click Settings
- Scroll down to the “Vacation responder” section.
- Select Vacation responder on.
- Fill in the date range, subject, and message.
- Under your message, check the box if you only want your contacts to see your vacation reply.
- At the bottom of the page, click Save Changes.
Note: If you have a Gmail signature, it will be shown at the bottom of your vacation response.
Turn off your vacation reply
When your vacation reply is on, you’ll see a banner across the top of your inbox that shows the subject of your vacation response.
To turn off your vacation response, click End now.
When your vacation reply is sent
Your vacation reply starts at 12:00 AM on the start date and ends at 11:59 PM on the end date, unless you end it earlier.
In most cases, your vacation response is only sent to people the first time they message you.
Here are the times someone may see your vacation response more than once:
- If the same person contacts you again after four days and your vacation reply is still on, they’ll see your vacation response again.
- Your vacation response starts over each time you edit it. If someone gets your initial vacation response, then emails you again after you’ve edited your response, they’ll see your new response.
- If you use Gmail through your work, school, or other organization, you can choose whether your response is sent to everyone or only people in your organization.
Note: Messages sent to your spam folder and messages addressed to a mailing list you subscribe to won’t get your vacation response.