How to Message Your Boss When You are not Feeling Well! How to Write an Email | Guidable Japan

How to Message Your Boss When You are not Feeling Well! How to Write an Email

By Guidable Writers Jun 13, 2017

This post is also available in: Chinese (Simplified) French Italian Russian Spanish Vietnamese Portuguese (Brazil)

When You are not Feeling Well, How Should You Message Your Boss?

If you have worked in Japan for long, it is always possible for you to get sick, and you are not able to work for that day.

I have talked about what to do when you think that you are not able to work in the previous article:

What do you do when you cannot go to work because of illness? Appropriate ways to take a day off in Japan (English Only)

https://guidable.co/work/what-do-you-when-you-cannot-go-to-work-because-of-illness-appropriate-ways-to-take-a-day-off/

Explanation is Very Important! 

In this article, I would like to talk more about the basic manner that you have to be aware when you need to message your boss or your colleague about your absence. This article is going to explain the important rules of informing absence and the possible example of how to message your boss. I hope you can make the most of it!

In today’s society, most of the communication in a workplace is made through emails and texts. There are more and more companies that accept their workers to inform absence through message or emails. However, it is better for you to tell your boss directly through telephone because you want to be as polite as possible.

Therefore, just in case if you do not know what is the appropriate way to message your absence, you should ask your boss early if it is okay to message your boss for absence.

If you find out you are not able to work early in the morning, you might want to message your boss as early as possible. However, if you call or message your boss too early, they may not be able to receive your message, as they are still not in the office. Therefore, if you are planning to call your office or work place, remember to call them before 10 minutes before the company opens.

Sometimes, you might not able to call your office or your boss directly for various reasons. For example, you may not able to use your phone because you are in the hospital.

So, I am going to tell you the appropriate format of how to message your boss about your absences.

Outline of Your Email

The general outline of the message should look like this:

  1. Apologize for your absence
  2. Explain the reason why you are absent
  3. Explain who is going to substitute your work
  4. Apologize again for causing inconvenience

Template of how to write an email 

First, you should begin the title like this:

Title: [勤怠連絡]体調不良によりお休みをいただきます

勤怠(Kintai) means ‘presents and absences’, and in this context it means absence. You first need to show that you are writing in order to inform your absence. And in the next sentence, you should explain your reason of absence. If you want to say you are not feeling well, 体調不良(taichou furyou) is a good word for you to use.

And the body paragraph of your passage should look like this:

〇〇(your name)です。おはようございます。(greeting) 本日、体調不良につきお休みさせていただきます。(informing absence and the reason)

In the first sentence you are messaging your absence and the reason.

And the next sentences should be the follow;

ご迷惑おかけし大変申し訳ありません(apologize for causing inconvenience) 。昨夜から〇〇(disease and symptoms) のため安静にしておりましたが、今朝になっても改善されません。

(Explaining that you are suffering from your disease and you have rested last night, but you still did not recover.)

通院して静養するため、申し訳ありませんが本日はお休みさせてください。

(Explaining that you are going to the hospital today, and message that you are going to take a day-off)

なお、本日の〇〇(name of your project)の件については、〇〇(name of your colleague)さんに別途メールにて依頼する予定です。

(Inform your boss that you are asking your colleague to substitute your work through email.)

詳しい状況は症状が落ち着き次第、折り返しこちらからまた連絡させていただきます。

(Tell your boss that you are going to make a more detailed explanation after you recover from your illness, and tell him or her that you are going to contact him or her)

急を要する連絡には、私の携帯電話やメールにて対応させていただくようにいたします。

(Tell your boss that you have told your colleague that for any urgent issue, you have told them to message your phone)

ご迷惑をおかけしてすみませんが何卒よろしくお願いします。

(apologize again for causing trouble.)

This is one of the most decent template of how to write a message to inform your boss about your absence. This form of email should be used in office and if you are a part-time worker, you do not need to write so formally. The most important thing is that try to come up with many templates, so that you would be able to use them in urgent situation!


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