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With absentify’s out-of-office reply feature, HR admins can centrally manage and configure automated out-of-office messages for employees. This feature ensures clear, consistent communication for all scheduled absences by applying templates directly in employees’ Outlook settings.
Note: This feature is only available in the Plus Plan, allowing administrators to set and manage templates for all employees. In other plans, employees configure their out-of-office replies individually. See the employee guide here.

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Benefits of centralized management

  • Consistency: Ensures uniform communication for all employees.
  • Control: Admins can restrict employees from editing templates to maintain a professional tone.
  • Automation: Templates are applied automatically during scheduled absences and disabled when the absence ends.
  • Customization: Use placeholders to personalize replies for employees while maintaining a standard format.
Important: While absentify sets out-of-office replies in Outlook, employees can still manually change or disable these settings directly in Outlook. absentify cannot override such manual changes.

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Prerequisites

  1. Plus Plan: This feature is only available in the Plus Plan.
  2. Microsoft Tenant Admin Rights: To activate this feature, refer to the Outlook out-of-office permissions guide.
  3. Mailbox permission activated: The mailbox permission must be activated in absentify’s Settings > Microsoft Integration settings. If it is not activated, an overlay will inform you that the permission needs to be enabled first.
absentify uses the Microsoft Graph API with the MailboxSettings.ReadWrite permission. This permission is solely used to configure out-of-office replies; no other mailbox data is accessed or stored.

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User eligibility for bulk operations

When selecting multiple users for bulk out-of-office template editing, absentify automatically checks each user’s eligibility. A user is eligible only if:
  • Their Microsoft account is linked to absentify.
  • The MailboxSettings.ReadWrite permission is available for their Microsoft tenant.
Ineligible users are automatically filtered out and a warning banner lists the excluded users along with the specific reason (e.g., “No Microsoft account linked” or “Mailbox permission missing for user’s tenant”). If all selected users are ineligible, the bulk edit dialog will explain why the operation cannot proceed.
In multi-tenant environments, admin consent must be granted for each tenant individually. If some users belong to a tenant where the permission has not been granted, those users will be excluded from the bulk operation.

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Configuring automatic out-of-office replies

1

Access user management

  • Log into absentify and navigate to Settings > Users.
  • Select the employees for whom you want to manage out-of-office templates.
  • Click Bulk edit and choose Manage out of office notifications.
2

Select leave types

  • Select the leave type or multiple leave types you want to associate with an out-of-office template. All selected employees will share the same template for the chosen leave type(s).
  • Continue to template configuration.
3

Edit the message using the template editor

Use the rich text editor to format the message (font, size, bold, lists, and links).
Use dynamic placeholders to automatically insert absence-specific details into each message as soon as the leave request is active.Available variables include:
  • User and leave information:
    • First name, Last name, Full name
    • Leave type name
    • Start date, Start time
    • End date, End time
    • Date of return, Time of return
  • Approver variables:
    • Approver name, Approver email
    • For specific approvers, use indexed variables like Approver name[1], Approver email[1], Approver name[2], and so on.
  • Representative variables: These placeholders are only available if selecting a representative is mandatory for the chosen leave type. You can find more information in the representative requirement guide.
    • Representative name, Representative email
    • For specific approvers, use indexed variables like Representative name[1], Representative email[1], Representative name[2], and so on.
4

Use conditional templates

Open Conditional Templates to control when certain parts of the message are shown. Conditional templates are especially useful when certain data may not always be available for a leave request. Common use cases for conditional templates include:Available conditional options:
  • If Representative: Show content only if a representative is assigned.
    Examples of scenarios where this is useful:
    • Optional representative requirement: If the representative requirement is set to optional in the leave type settings, not every leave request will have a representative assigned.
    • Admin override scenarios: Even if a leave type requires a representative, an admin may override this requirement for a specific leave request.
  • If Approver: Show content only if an approver exists.
    Examples of scenarios where this is useful:
    • Leave types without approval: Some leave types do not require approval. This ensures approver-related information is only displayed when an approval flow exists.
    • Skipped or auto-approved requests: If a request is automatically approved or an approval step is skipped, no approver may be assigned.
  • Multiple Representatives: Loop through all assigned representatives.
    Examples of scenarios where this is useful:
    • Users may be assigned multiple representatives and can change the order or remove them during the request process.
  • Multiple Approvers: Loop through all approvers in the approval flow.
    Examples of scenarios where this is useful:
    • Different approval flows per leave type: Approval chains can vary depending on the leave type.
5

Preview and test the message

  • Use the Preview option to review the message.
  • Click Send test email to see how the message appears in an inbox.
6

Configure external replies

  • Enable replies for external contacts by selecting Send replies outside your organization.
  • Limit replies to contacts only by selecting Send replies only to contacts.
7

Allow or restrict employee customization

  • Decide if employees can customize their out-of-office messages:
    • Check the box if employees are allowed to make adjustments. Send them this guide for more information on the setup.
    • Restrict customization to enforce the admin-defined template.
The “Allow customization” setting in absentify only controls whether the message can be edited within absentify — it does not restrict the user’s ability to change the message directly in Outlook.
8

Save your changes

Click Save to apply the updated out-of-office message templates.
Do you want to edit an individual user’s out-of-office message or view the currently set template?
Check out our guide on editing individual out-of-office messages.

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How out-of-office replies work

absentify allows you to automate out-of-office replies in Outlook based on the selected leave type and predefined templates. These replies are not sent by absentify directly — instead, absentify configures the settings in Outlook via Microsoft Graph API.
absentify does not send out-of-office messages itself.
All replies are triggered and handled by Microsoft Outlook and Azure after absentify applies the settings.

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Common issues and how to troubleshoot them

  • “Microsoft mailbox permissions are not activated” This error appears when the Microsoft Mailbox permission has not been activated in absentify. Go to Settings > Integrations > Outlook Out of Office and ensure the permission is set to Activated. See the permissions guide for details.
  • “Outlook out-of-office replies are not available for [user names]” This error indicates that one or more selected users are not eligible for automatic out-of-office replies. This happens when:
    • The user’s account is not linked to a Microsoft 365 / Entra ID account, or
    • The required MailboxSettings.ReadWrite permission has not been granted for the user’s Microsoft tenant.
    Ensure all affected users have their Microsoft accounts linked in absentify and that the tenant admin has granted the necessary permissions.
  • Manual changes in Outlook If a user manually disables or edits the out-of-office reply directly in Outlook, absentify cannot reapply the template until the next approved absence. Any manual changes override the configuration set by absentify.
  • Unable to apply automatic reply If absentify cannot apply the automatic reply, the affected user will receive an email with instructions to set it manually. Admins are also notified of the failed attempt via email.
  • Out-of-office message not being sent
    If no out-of-office replies are being sent from a user’s mailbox, but the sync log shows a successful configuration, the issue lies with Microsoft Outlook, not absentify.     Follow these steps to investigate:
    1. Go to Settings > Microsoft > View sync logs, or open the Microsoft sync logs directly.
    2. Locate the log for the user and the relevant date of the approved leave request.
    3. If the log shows “successful”, this confirms absentify has correctly applied the out-of-office configuration in Outlook.
    In this case, you can:
    • Check mail flow rules, mailbox permissions, or conditional settings in Outlook.
    • Escalate the issue internally to your Microsoft 365 administrator or to Microsoft/Azure support, as this is beyond absentify’s control.