help me find a non sexist credit card!

I have recently married and our finances are separate - I pay the bills and he puts the right amount in my account every month.

I rang up British gas to put DH on the bill so he could talk to them, bearing in mind I have been the customer, and the bill comes out of MY account. To my annoyance we recieved a letter address to Mr & Mrs DoesNot's DH GiveAFig.

Pissed me off so much, where's MY name? Why am I all of a sudden Mrs DoesNot's DH GiveAFig instead of just mrs DoesNotGiveAFig? grr. Sorry for the hijack.

I'd guessed that! you in labour yet? [ducks]

sorry bumpybecky that was to LRD not to you!

I think a joint account would induce a migraine at the very least for me! :)

I kind of see what you're saying LRD, but I'm just wary of entwining my finances with any other person more than is absolutely necessary. A dear friend was unable to get a divorce for 2 years because of a dispute related to debts run up by her ex on a joint account shortly after they split. She was unable to get the account closed while it was in overdraft and he refused to pay anything in to clear it. She couldn't afford to pay off the overdraft herself so was well and truly stuck. It was an absolute nightmare.

I guess the underlying issue is that if you are in a position where you have to share responsibility for financial management with another person, be they partner or housemate, you absolutely have to have clear communication and preferably, similar attitudes to money, or there could be choppy seas ahead.

Anyhow, sorry that that is quite a diversion from the original thread.

nah, i don't think they do

In our case DH was the first applicant for the Tesco card as I am a SAHM so he's the one with the income, so more likely to get the card. We got very fed up with them refusing to speak to me, so he wrote a letter (well I did, but in his name and he signed it!) authorising them to talk to me. Now when they call they'll talk to me, sometimes they need to check the file for the authorisation, but it's not been a problem :)

True.

I think maybe joint accounts induce the things that lead to you getting in a state where you eventually do go into labour...

nickelbabe is distracting herself from her other concerns by posting on here and I thought nothing would be better than another reminder she's not yet in labor.

I'm not sure she loves me very much right now.

I don't get it...

The real question is, do joint accounts induce labour?

(Don't kill me, don't kill me!)

I even had a joint account with my friend when we rented a house together.
It's a very sensible way of doing it - not to be your only account obviously!
but as a "kitty" then it's essential - both of us put a set amount in every month, based on our bills and groceries (we had things that weren't allowed to be bought from the joint account - eg she couldn't buy fish, because I wouldn't eat it, and I wasn't allowed to use it for tampons, because she had about 8million of them ), but most food and toiletries we shared, so came out of the joint account.

it meant that there was never a "you owe me £30 for the gas bill" scenario, and if we needed anything for the house, either of us could get it without having to consult the other.

Kri - not having a mortgage or anything, it may be a bit different here. However:

I have a joint account with DH (or three) because we share money. We also have our own accounts. But big expenses like the rent money and money for food come out of the joint account, and we both pay more-or-less equal amounts into that account from our own separate accounts.

In my experience, if you don't have a joint account, you are in a constant process of working out who can afford to pay what. If you're stuck with a selfish bloke, as I have been, you find he's telling you he can't afford anything and you end up paying, and if you are very naive and stupid, you believe him when he promises he'll even it up by paying his share later, and you end up several thousand pounds down with him saying 'but you could afford it and I couldn't, all my money went on games and books and so on, so really I was poor and you can say bye to the money'.

At least if you have a joint account you can see where the bulk of the money is and how it's being spent. You both know if there's not enough there to cover rent and you can both scramble to work out how to sort that. You don't end up in the situation that comes up on MN quite often, when one partner has lied about paying rent, or some important bill, and the family is about to be cut off or evicted. It's more secure.

I don't think, on our joint account, DH can do much without me knowing. I would notice if we went overdrawn, that sort of thing. IME a joint account is much more secure. I can see some of the risks but it doesn't compare to the stress of someone who will not get a joint account with you - IMO that is a huge red flag.

We have a joint account into which we both pay money, then this account pays for all bills/food/rent/household expenses.

Much simpler than doing maths over "I spent £40 in Sainsburys and you spent £120 on house insurance".

I had problems getting my John Lewis fridge repaired, because the bint woman on the other end of the line kept asking to speak to my husband to authorise it all, and I asked what he had to do with anything, as I had bought and paid for the fridge and all the paperwork was in my name.

She disputed this and later I realised it was because it was 'Dr BoffinMum' on the paperwork, and she had assumed the Dr would have to be my husband.

I rang back and found that he had been apparently ennobled by John Lewis, and was now 'Sir BoffinMum' as they had pulled the wrong thing down from the drop down menu. He liked that.

Nationwide put me first on our account, so we get post to Dr Kveta and Mr DH. I would go in there all guns blazing if they changed it, as I opened the account in the first place. They have been pretty good though, so would recommend them.

I had a credit card account which I added DH to. I am the primary account holder and the bank won't deal with him over anything. It's irritating sometimes when I'd like it to be him who sorts things out. But, like you OP, I am the family banker, so there you go.

Perhaps you could open your own credit card account and then a couple of months later add your DH to it? That way it will definitely be you who is the primary account holder.

I don't like using titles of any kind. I especially don't like the fact that when I'm asked for a title as a woman, I'm almost always offered only Miss or Mrs, which is the same as asking my marital status when there is no need for the person to know that. Credit card companies and banks insist, so mine have Ms on them.

Perhaps I'm being naive here, but I'm kind of surprised that so many folks have said they have joint credit cards and bank accounts with their partners or spouses. I've been married twice and never had any joint accounts with my DH. I know Martin Lewis (the MSE guy,) strongly recommends couples DON'T have joint accounts because they are harder to manage and if things go pear shaped in the relationship, can be used by one as ammunition against the other. Your credit score can go belly up if you end up connected with someone who then develops bad credit.

I know this is a bit of a tangent (sorry op), but would it not make more sense just to have separate credit card and bank accounts? The name issue wouldn't be an issue in that case, for starters. If one person earns more than the other, they could set up a standing order to transfer money into the account of the other each month. I'm genuinely curious what the benefit is in having a joint account of any kind.

I do understand having a mortgage together. Sometimes unrelated friends who buy together also have a mortgage in both or all their names but either make payments separately or set up an arrangement for one to pay their share to the other who then pays the bill. That's what DH and I do - clean, paper trail of transactions and all that.

Maybe I am missing something obvious here! :)

Can you remember whose name you applied for the credit card in initially?

I quite love 'mrs and mr pirate'. Why has that never occurred to me before? Excuse me while I go change rather a lot of joint documentation.

We have just opened a joint account with credit cards with natwest and I am the primary account holder because I opened it, on our cards it says Mrs and Mr and all paperwork names me first, I was quite pleasantly surprised actually!

I'm with first direct and I am primary card holder - because it was my credit card first and dh was added later.
I don't know how many banks have systems that assume the man is the primary card holder by default (i.e. without asking) but I guess the way to be sure when you open your next account is to make sure your name goes first (and to double check with them that you are the primary holder). If that is what you want of course - but it does seem that for a credit card its not possible to have a truly joint card. Not sure why not, given that its perfectly possible to be jointly liable for a mortgage or for council tax

I think that there has to be a primary account holder. I'm the primary account holder on my account, and my DH has the second card.

Are you sure it's sexist?

It's clearly wrong to change from joint to having one person be in charge.

But if Lloyds did that to our joint account I would be the primary cardholder because my name is first on the account.

At some point when you registered you said one name before the other.

Our joint current account is with nationwide and the letters come to Mrs sardine & mr sardine

Credit card is john lewis and I am primary person and he is just an addition although in theory that means he could run up a massive bill and I'd have to pay.

for you though. Although as others point out it might always have been that way and you only just found out cos you called them