Questioning 'Ms' on screening

[coldemortreturns]

Am currently undergoing pre employment screening. Filled in my title as 'Ms'. Got an email back this morning asking for further information. It goes
'I notice you've declared your title as 'Ms'. Could you please advise if you have been known by another name and the dates for those name changes'
The assumption I'm assuming is that 1) 'Ms' is divorced and 2) had changed her name.
Theres a section you complete for name changes, so you would complete that. Not sure 'Ms' requires further checking.
Bit

@Time40

Miss. it’s for old lady spinsters or little girls

No it isn't. I'm a proud Miss, and I'm neither of those things. I wouldn't change to Ms if you paid me thousands.

What is there to be proud of? It's a meaningless title that should be done away with as they serve no purpose except saddle women with an irritation that men escape completely.

No-one asks men what their title is and then makes assumptions about them, because a lot of people do. Men just tick the Mr box and get on with their day.

I used to work in HR recruitment doing all the pre employment checks (including DBS / CRB checks) if someone stated 'Ms' on those forms and hadn't checked the box to confirm explicitly they'd never been known by any another forms then the application would be rejected by the checking agency and we would have to go back and ask it explicitly and get them to reply explicitly on record before it could get processed. Its just because 'Ms' could indicate someone has been known by a previous name so not checking that isn't fulfilling obligation to do complete checks. we never cared at all whether people called themselves miss mrs ms Dr captain.... whatever but we had certain boxes to tick that caused us to have to go back and get further info. Its procedure i wouldn't read too much into it. We had men select ms and that's fine too but we still had to ask them if they'd been known by any other names. its a pain i know xx

Surely this is sex discrimination? They should have a separate question on the form to ask if you've ever been known by other names.

Urgh, I hope this isn’t indicative of their general attitude! I’ve been a ms since I was about twenty. Plus even if you were divorced, you might not have changed your name when you got married, it’s not compulsory

But @littlekipling, surely you should have been checking with anyone who failed to confirm explicitly that they had never been known by another name? Why particularly target those with the title "Ms"?

The whole point of the "Ms" title is to give women an option that doesn't refer to their marital status, but it seems that irresponsible HR teams are using it in exactly the opposite manner.

Yes and yes we did (question anyone who had not ticked the box) but some smaller companies are crap at how they interpret the checking rules etc so was just saying they could have been doing it in this way but approaching it wrong.

If its upset/ bothered you then you have every right to ask them about it and call them out on it. Nothing should ever make you feel discriminated against and a good HR / Recruitment professional will know and respond to that xx

I thought we were in an era of respecting people’s pronouns and one made fit assume, titles. You have chosen Ms. that I assume is the title you feel most comfortable with. You’ve filled out the ‘previous names’ section of the form, what further explanation do they need?

Also - if they have done it in the way you're suggesting- ask yourself if you want to work for such a discriminatory / backwards thinking organisation. I'd ask them and if it was clear they'd done that I'd not want to work there as I doubt they'd have a great culture and attitudes to women

• one might assume

It's fair enough if you check everyone who fails to complete the form properly, but that doesn't sound the case with OP. They are specifically checking because she used the title "ms".

I'd wait till the end of the recruitment process, OP, and then raise the issue with them. It isn't on.

This is definitely not chased with Mr is it, even though name changes exist with Mr.

They'd love me though, I'm a Ms since day dot but have had three surnames. And of course because Ms is seemingly a mistake or you must clearly be something I've also been known as Miss and Mrs of every surname at some point regardless of whether I was married/unmarried/declared myself as Ms.

I had this problem with my CRB check a decade ago - and I HAD ticked the "no previous names" box and section.

Like you I was cross at the twin assumptions that a) I was "Ms" because I'd been married then divorced b) that during my (fictional) marriage I must have changed my name.

When I complained CRB people at the time said the police (!) required them to ask. I complained to them as well. Fuckers. Can't believe this is still happening.

Just goes to show there is truly NO TITLE women can use that avoids us having to talk about or disclose our marital status. It's unbelievably silly especially when most other countries seem to have dispensed with this. I make the comparison to men being known as Divorced Boris Johnson or Single Zayn Malik.

This type of everyday sexism would put me off the job, personally. Really interesting that this is the second time I’ve seen the ‘ms’ issue raised on mn in a matter of days. It clearly bothers a lot of women.

I was ‘missed’ yesterday in a large email chain and it annoyed me for hours! I felt really infantilised and now wondering whether/how to bring it up. I’m sorry you’re having to ‘explain’ yourself. I’ve been a proud ‘Ms’ since I was a teen, but as @WitchWife says, this proves there’s no title that’s safe for us to use and that’s sad.