SOURCE: Vacation Tracker TITLE: Can a Vacation Tracker Admin or Approver Turn On/Off the OOO Feature for Users? URL: https://vacationtracker.io/knowledge-base/can-a-vacation-tracker-admin-or-approver-turn-onoff-the-ooo-out-of-office-feature-for-users/ LANG: en PUBLISHED: 2023-08-16 UPDATED: 2026-01-20 READING: 1 min SUMMARY: Can a Vacation Tracker Admin or Approver turn on/off the OOO (Out of Office) feature for users? # Can a Vacation Tracker Admin or Approver Turn On/Off the OOO Feature for Users? # Can a Vacation Tracker Admin or Approver Turn On/Off the OOO Feature for Users? Short answer: no. The Out-of-Office (OOO) reply feature is tied to a User's own account and depends on that User authorizing access to their personal email provider (Gmail or Outlook). Even an Admin can't enable, disable, or set up OOO on someone else's behalf — each User has to do it themselves under their own Account Settings. An Admin wants to turn OOO on for the whole company so leaves automatically post an email autoreply. They open Workspace Settings looking for a global toggle, find nothing, and reach out to Support. The reason there's no global toggle: each User has to grant Vacation Tracker permission to write to their inbox via Google or Microsoft OAuth — that consent can't be delegated. The right path is to coach each User on enabling OOO from their own Account Settings. ## Why Only the User Can Turn It On The OOO autoreply works by Vacation Tracker setting an "I'm out of office" message on the User's Gmail or Outlook account when their leave starts, and clearing it when the leave ends. To do that, Vacation Tracker needs write access to that User's mailbox — and the only way to get that access is through an OAuth permission flow that the User runs themselves. Gmail and Outlook both prompt the User for explicit consent during the connection step, showing exactly which scopes Vacation Tracker is asking for. The screens the User sees during OAuth look like: ![Google permissions consent screen showing the scopes Vacation Tracker is requesting (manage your basic settings, send emails on your behalf, etc.) with Allow / Deny buttons](https://cms.vacationtracker.io/uploads/helpdesk_artikal_can_a_vacation_tracker_admin_or_approver_turn_onoff_the_ooo_out_of_office_feature_for_users_first_image_place_e0ad9972a2.png) Microsoft Outlook permissions screen with the requested scopes for sending mail and adjusting OOO replies, with Accept / Cancel buttons ## Where the User Sets It Up OOO setup lives on each User's Account Settings page (accessed from the profile menu in the bottom-left of the sidebar). The path is: - The User signs in to app.vacationtracker.io (https://app.vacationtracker.io/signin). - They click their name in the bottom-left of the sidebar and choose Account Settings from the dropdown menu, or go directly to app/settings/personal (https://app.vacationtracker.io/app/settings/personal). - Under Configure Automatic Out-of-Office (OOO) Reply, they flip the Enabled toggle on, pick which Leave Types should trigger an OOO prompt, and click Save. - When the User's email provider's permission flow is needed (typically the first time an OOO reply needs to fire), Gmail or Outlook will prompt them to grant access. Only the User can complete that consent. Detailed setup walk-through and the per-leave-type filter are covered in the Automatic OOO Reply Guide (https://vacationtracker.io/knowledge-base/guide-automatic-out-of-office-ooo-reply-autoreply/) and the related article Can I Choose Which Leave Types Have the OOO Message? (https://vacationtracker.io/knowledge-base/can-i-choose-which-leave-types-have-the-out-of-office-ooo-message/) ## What an Admin Can Do While Admins can't toggle OOO on or off for individual Users, they can still help adoption indirectly: - Educate the team — share the OOO Reply Guide and the per-leave-type filter article so Users know what's available and how to set it up. - Send a workspace announcement via Slack/Teams notification or email, prompting Users to enable OOO on their own Account Settings. - Confirm leave types are set up the way you want them — the OOO prompt fires for whichever types are in each User's allow list. Adjusting the underlying Leave Types doesn't directly enable OOO, but it shapes which approvals trigger the prompt. - Roll out by integration — if your team is on Google Workspace, the OAuth process is the same for everyone in your domain; document the consent screen once and reference it during onboarding. ## Common Questions Is there a workspace-level setting to turn OOO off for everyone? No. There's no Admin-side master switch that hides or disables OOO across the workspace. Each User who hasn't connected their email provider simply won't have an active OOO reply — even with the Account Settings toggle on. So the practical default for non-onboarded Users is "OOO is off for me," which doesn't require any Admin action. Can I do the OAuth on someone's behalf if I have their password? This isn't a recommended path — sharing credentials goes against most security policies and Vacation Tracker doesn't endorse it. Workspace and provider audit logs would still show the connection happening from the actual email account, which is fine technically but a poor security practice. Walk the User through the setup themselves. Why is OOO different from things like the Slack Status Update? The Slack Status Update feature relies on Vacation Tracker's existing workspace-level Slack connection, set up once at install time. That connection covers every User in the workspace (Slack scopes it that way). Email OOO is the opposite — Gmail and Outlook scope mailbox-write permissions per User, so each person has to authorize separately. Same product, different constraint imposed by the upstream platforms. ### What's Next? Guide: Automatic Out of Office (OOO) Reply (Autoreply) (https://vacationtracker.io/knowledge-base/guide-automatic-out-of-office-ooo-reply-autoreply/) Can I Choose Which Leave Types Have the OOO Message? (https://vacationtracker.io/knowledge-base/can-i-choose-which-leave-types-have-the-out-of-office-ooo-message/) How do I enable the OOO Autoreply Feature? (https://vacationtracker.io/knowledge-base/how-do-i-enable-the-ooo-out-of-office-autoreply-feature/) Need help? Contact our Support team via email (mailto:hello@vacationtracker.io) or chat (#), Monday to Friday, 9 AM – 5 PM EST.