Setting a vacation message

Reasons NOT to set a vacation message:

You belong to Wittenberg mailing lists.
While we can try to alleviate message circles with Wittenberg mailing lists (you receive a message from facnstaff, you're automatically replying to facnstaff, so you receive a copy of the reply, so you automatically reply again creating a circle), we may find it necessary to remove you from particular mailing lists.

You belong to mailing lists outside Wittenberg.
Other administrators of lists - both professional and personal - tend to be more strict and will simply remove you from the list after a couple of messages.

You're on a list used by those outside the university.
The automatic message can't differentiate between one message and another. And example would be a message sent by a parent to the solution@wittenberg.edu address, which is a mailing list (as are all of the addresses used by the outside to contact departments). Not only would the solution group receive the vacation message, so would the parent asking the question. Right after that they would receive another message from another staff member to answer the original question, causing unnecessary confusion.

You receive junk e-mail seeking information - such as a confirmation of your e-mail address. As a rule we advise against replying to junk mail since it can be used to verify your address.

Setting a vacation message:

• Log into the WittLink Portal.
• In the column on the left under Email, click "Vacation Message."
• Using the drop down boxes, choose your starting and ending dates for the vacation message.
• Fill in the subject line of the message to send.
• Complete the body of the message delivered to OUTSIDE e-mail addresses. This will only be sent to non-Wittenberg e-mail addresses.
• Complete the body of the message delivered to INSIDE e-mail addresses. This will only be sent to Wittenberg e-mail addresses.
• Click Save Message.


*Note - Each e-mail address will only receive ONE response from you every 72 hours, no matter how many times you receive mail from that address. This may or not help with mail loops and mailing lists, because it will depend on the setup of the mailing list.

Disabling a vacation message:

• Log into the WittLink Portal.
• In the column on the left under Email, click Vacation Message."
• Click the "Click Here to deactivate" message on the right.