Out of Office Quick Start Guide
Out of Office Assistant passes your work items to a colleague while you are away. This guide covers one task: creating your first absence rule for yourself. Every licensed user can do that, and it needs no administrator rights.
Before you start
Out of Office Assistant is installed on your Jira site. If it is not, see Installation and Setup Guide.
Your Jira account holds an Out of Office Assistant license. Without one the app's controls are locked or hidden. See Permissions and Access Requirements.
Create your first rule
In Jira, open Apps in the left navigation and select Out of Office Assistant. The app opens on the Team Availability tab.
Select the My Rules tab, then Add rule for myself at the top right. The form opens as a full page under the heading Schedule your Out of Office Rule.
Set Start Date. It is the only field on the form marked as required, and your timezone is printed underneath it.
Set End Date (Optional) if you know when you are back. Leave it empty and the rule is open ended.
Leave the fields in between on their defaults - Start Time and End Time on All day, Work Item Selection on Spaces with All spaces - so the rule runs whole days and covers every work item assigned to you.
In Coverers, type a colleague's name and select them from the list. They are the person your work items go to.
Your rule acts on work items that reach you while it runs. Anything already assigned to you stays with you: to hand that over too, use Bulk assign on the rule's row afterwards.
Select Create Rule. The rule is created, and My Rules lists it.
To leave the form without creating anything, use Cancel at the bottom or Back to Rules at the top left.
If Create Rule stays greyed out
Dates on their own are not a rule. Create Rule stays disabled until the rule actually does something.
Give the rule at least one of the following, and the button becomes available:
a person in Coverers, who takes over the work items
a person in Approver Coverers, who takes over approvals
text in Message Text, which the app can post as a comment on the work items the rule reassigns
a tick in Show Out of Office status in work item glance only (skip coverer, approver, and message)., which shows your status in the work item glance and nothing else
The form carries more fields than this task needs. Rule Configuration Guide covers all of them.
Related pages
Rule Configuration Guide - every field on the rule form.
Issue Assignment and Watcher Management - what happens to a work item the rule reassigns, including the comment.
The List of Out of Office Rules - the columns and row actions on My Rules.
Bulk Assign - handing over the work items already assigned to you.