E-Mail Correspondence

Office communication, once conducted using letter paper, is dealt with today quickly and effectively using e-mail. Since January 1, 2007, § 80 Para. 1 of the German Stock Corporation Act (Aktiengesetz) has stipulated that e-mails can represent legal correspondence and must therefore include specific compulsory commercial information on the company. The formal requirements for the signature in business e-mail correspondence should also be observed accordingly on mobile end devices.

Since they serve as “electronic business letters”, e-mails containing legally-relevant explanations or information for customers, suppliers or authorities must contain the prescribed company details with the legal form, domicile, court of registry, commercial register number, Chairman of the Supervisory Board and Board of Management members. This information is not necessary in internal email correspondence or in informal e-mails to colleagues at other Daimler AG companies and its subsidiaries.

E-mail footer with all mandatory commercial details and BoM information 
(as revised on May 23, 2019)

Formal Requirements for the Signature in Business E-Mails

Daimler’s company font Daimler CS should not be used in e-mail correspondence because this font is not pre-installed on the recipients’ computers outside Daimler AG, resulting in changes to the appearance of the text, line breaks etc. The Calibri (11 pt) system font is the default setting in the Outlook application. This font features a high level of technical compatibility across operating systems and enables a neutral data transfer between different software programs on various end devices.

No emphasis in color, bold and/or italicItalic
Having the characteristic of type with main strokes slanting. and no facsimile signatures are to be used. Daimler’s logotype is also not used in the signature, but rather reproduced as text. The correct form for phone and fax numbers is to separate digits in groups of two from right to left.

The e-mail disclaimer (“If you are not the intended recipient of this e-mail ...”) should not be manually incorporated into the signature settings. The system automatically adds it (in English) to external e-mails. The notice is not required in internal communication.

The e-mail signature should be set up in English, if possible. This is not to be viewed as an explicit rule but rather as practical guidance in daily work, which the e-mail signature is to offer to foreign recipients. The use of German terms is of course permitted. The e-mail signature must also be used when using mobile end devices.

The e-mail signature may also include information on availability if the employee works part-time for example (Available from Monday to Wednesday from 8.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m.).

The mandatory information on the company, including Daimler AG’s current BoM footer, is stored automatically and manually added to emails in the “Outlook” program if the paragraph symbol [§] is selected and the corresponding option is chosen in the “Mandatory information” field in the “Message” tab. The footer for business emails with all the legally-relevant company information also applies when using mobile end devices.

Example of an E-Mail Signature for Employees at Daimler AG

The following example is merely intended as a guide for dealing with sender information and prescribed legally-relevant company details in the e-mail footer:

Out-of-Office Notification

The out-of-office message is an automatically generated standard message, which is set up in the Outlook e-mail application.

The wording of the out-of-office message should be brief and informative. On the one hand, the recipient should be informed about the duration of the absence. In addition, the out-of-office message should contain information about other responsible contact persons or provide the name of the available deputy in the company. In this respect, it should be ensured that in addition to the phone number and email address of the deputy, the availability of the deputy should also be disclosed if it differs from the regular working hours. 

Standard out-of-office message in German/English

The out-of-office message is generally programmed in two languages and will be typeset in the system font Calibri (11 pt). No emphasis using different fonts or colors may be used.
In addition to the general out-of-office message, the function “Mail on Holiday” is also available. If “Mail on Holiday” is activated, incoming mails are deleted for the duration of the holiday and the senders receive a special out-of-office message. Further detailed information on the activation of these functions, which are available only in the Outlook application, as well as questions and answers are provided for you on the Daimler Social IntranetIntranet
A computer network for a closed group of users within a company or organization. under the Portal code “@MailonHoliday.”