I was out of office vs I had been out of office

These are both acceptable phrases, but they would be used in dissimilar contexts. 'I was out of office' is used to indicate a past action or state of being, while 'I had been out of office' is used to indicate a past action or state that occurred before another past action. They are not directly comparable as they serve different purposes.

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Editor at TextRanch

Last updated: December 18, 2024 • 8339 views

This phrase is correct and commonly used to indicate a past action or state of being.

"I was out of office"

This phrase is used to inform someone that you were not in the office at a specific time in the past.

Examples:

I was out of office last week due to a family emergency.
She couldn't reach me because I was out of office on vacation.
Sorry for the delay in responding, I was out of office for a few days.
I was out of office when the client called, but I will get back to them soon.
During the meeting, I was out of office dealing with another urgent matter.

Show examples from the web [+]
Last updated: November 21, 2024

"I was out of office" is a correct and usable phrase in written English. You can use it when you need to explain why you weren't available for a period of time.
Aug 22, 2023 ... Last week I was out of office from the end of the day on Wednesday through the following Tuesday evening. No agendas. No timelines.
Aug 23, 2024 ... My teams is on available, out of office. I was out of office days ago. How do I remove the out of office.
Jun 12, 2023 ... The worst part is I was out of office bc I was getting married/ on my honeymoon. So had I known I could have actually fixed it easily with ...
May 16, 2024 ... joannehawker on May 16, 2024: "My small business didn't get the memo I was out of office its impossible to silence my brain when I'm not ...
May 24, 2021 ... I'm doing live algo trading. I was out of office for the last few hours and when I came back, I noticed that the last order was placed about 12:37 EDT.
Thanks for following up with Breffni while I was out of office. As promised, I asked that our engineers look into this, and they have now come back to ...
May 15, 2024 ... Last week I was out of office enjoying a wonderful trip with my wife! We had so much fun soaking up the salt water and sunshine, enjoying the ...
May 7, 2024 ... I was out of office on Tuesday. On Tuesday night at 9.30pm, my manager decided to schedule a meeting for 12pm on Wednesday. He had also ...
May 19, 2024 ... Sales + Business Coach | Meghan (@meghan.lamle). 4 Likes. I was out of office for a WEEK and my business didn't stop because I had people ...

This phrase is correct and is used to indicate a past action that occurred before another past action.

"I had been out of office"

This phrase is used when you want to convey that you were not in the office for a period of time that ended before another specified past event.

Examples:

I had been out of office for a week before I received your message.
By the time I returned, I had been out of office for two days.
She realized she had been out of office during the crucial meeting.
Before the project deadline, I had been out of office due to illness.
The team had been out of office for training when the issue arose.

Show examples from the web [+]
Last updated: November 21, 2024

The phrase 'I had been out of office' is correct and usable in written English. You might use it to explain why you weren't available to do something.
Jan 23, 2023 ... If I had been out of office and Gmail had auto-responded. The FreshService rep would have not seen my auto-responses. Is there a way this ...
Jun 27, 2023 ... You know, when I was deciding whether or not to run again for office — and I had been out of office four years. I was a full professor at ...
The four years I had been out of office the State instigated the most moumental changes to our tax system, taking us from our old method in place since ...
... I had been out of office two days. It was 1998. Two days after I left office. we opened the ballpark. I threw out the first ball with Kirk Humphreys who was ...
Feb 3, 2015 ... “I noted that it was particularly gratifying to know that, even though I had been out of office for more than one year, my fellow DAs still ...
Aug 19, 2022 ... Good luck in your new journey Paul Esposito , was very surprised when I found out about your departure as I had been out of office for a while.
May 16, 2012 ... Sorry, I had been out of office all day, but flagged for me to pickup once I got back in. I had not spotted one of the original points you ...
Oct 7, 2024 ... And so that by 2008, I had been out of office for seven years or so and, but I had remained in touch with the work, doing the work in different ...

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I was out of office vs I had been out of office

"I was out of office"

"I had been out of office"

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