Do you have a joint email address with your spouse/partner?

[unlikelychump]

We've had one for 15 years now but it seems to have turned into a hindrance rather than a help. Part of a wider issue of course, but it has turned into just another inbox for me to manage with my DH having opportunity to read stuff (and not take action.)

If you have one how do you manage it, if you don't have one how do you manage admin stuff between you - just forwarding emails over?

(3 kids so lots of school stuff etc)

We do and we're neither elderly or in a controlling relationship! We use it for holiday bookings, the vet when we had a cat and Ocado deliveries, basically anything we both need to know about or deal with. We have our own personal emails for anything else.

I often think this would make sense! The primary school will only email one parent so I get all the emails from them, i screenshot and send DH any information he needs in WhatsApp - same for club info etc. I tend to organise & book everything too, again would make so much sense if it was all in the same place.

What do you mean by elderly ? I am late 60s, DH 75 and we have never had a joint email and never would .
One of DD’s friends ( mid 30s) has one with her DP which I find a bit strange .

We do for anything like logging into bill accounts where there can only be one email address connected to the account. We both have access. We don’t use it for nursery though, they just email us both as we’re both on their parent list.

I never ever read the joint email, he does all that admin. I manage the money though, so it’s a fairly weird division of labour but seems to work for us.

We have one in the cat’s name that only the supermarket delivery and streaming service emails go to.

It’s so we can both check the substitutes in advance and both get codes or update passwords.

We each have our own but started a joint one when wedding planning just to have a central point for vendors. The idea was that we were gana delete it after the wedding and avoid all the spam continuing to our normal accounts but found it so useful we just kept it and use it now for things like mortgage, utilities and joint holidays.

i don’t find it any extra faff and wouldn’t DREAM of getting anyone to email us at that address (who emails each other anyway?). Key benefit I’ve found is if I need to find a document quickly I know it’s there or login to something joint without having to ask what the email and password are.

3 kids, lots of hobbies etc. All go to my email.

Anything that needs to be shared is forwarded though generally I just screen shot it & put it in our family WhatsApp chat so we both have access to the info.

We just talk to,each other.,we wouldn’t rely on the other to check emails solely..Anything like a holiday booking I just forward. Things like the mortgage they send to both our emails, as we are both on the mortgage,

Definitely weird.

My recently-retired manager (in my side contracting job) used a joint email for all his professional emails.

It was literally joeandjanebloggs at...

He'd be sending really quite important/confidential work related emails from it.

I can only hope that, like some pps above, it started as a joint one but then his wife got her own and stopped looking at the old one.

I just think joint email accounts are not a good look at all. For school emails, the school should have both parents' contact details and CC you both as standard. No need for a joint one.

You do know you can forward emails onto people so they have a copy in their inbox 🤣

We have a joint one we used for stuff to do with our wedding, but I don’t think either of us have logged into it in about six months - I haven’t, anyway. We’re childfree and have separate finances though, so no need for other joint comms. I don’t think it’s that unusual for couples to have joint email accounts as well as their own individual ones; it’s weird when couples only have the joint one, though.

Yes. It’s the best thing ever to have a single email address to put down for our son and utilities builders etc. And then I have my own email for other stuff (really surprised that people think you can’t or wouldn’t have both).

Have you got them both loaded into you email client so you can see the combined inbox? Same for you husband and his personal email.

We also have a joint email, again for household and kid-related stuff (so think insurance, holiday bookings, school stuff). We have our own emails too. I see it as the email equivalent of our joint bank account for household bills (where we both have our own current accounts).

We started it for our wedding and then used for house moves and anything joint.

We both have separate personal emails and work emails.

It works well for us and we can find key information at later dates.

We are definitely not old, but whatever works for each couple. We do this with our banks too, a joint and separate accounts. Never felt controlling.

Yes. As do my adult DC and their partners. Even with the online accounts, there are still some communications/reminders sent by email from utility and insurance companies, council tax etc Often companies will only send emails to a single address. It makes sense to have a family “admin” address, just like I have a work and personal address. If it’s a shared address, it’s a shared responsibility! It’s all too easy for the responsibility for dealing with admin to fall on the person who gets the emails wife work.

Like this:

https://mailmeteor.com/blog/add-second-gmail-account

We have individual email accounts as well as a joint one. The joint one just forwards any emails to both personal accounts and is used for schools, utilities etc.

YEARS ago this was a regular - its totally inhibiting if you want to communicate
with one or the other specifically.
It is announcing, ‘We have no secrets from each other’ which is seriously weird
and unhealthy.
The jolly joint ones, John&JaneJohnson@ or The Johnsons!@ were usually
matching anoraks

I have 3 - one for regular admin, deliveries etc.
l for family only
l decoy, where the spam goes to perish

We do - not sure if 50 is judged elderly by other posters. Not in a controlling relationship - unless I'm the one do the controlling & haven't noticed.

Had it since 1990s and we both have access to it - it's used for family stuff, schools, life admin. I deal, by choice, with most of the e-admin but (like last week when I was in hospital for a big op) DH could pick up where'd I'd left off. No screenshots / no forwarding. Easy access if one of us dies suddenly / is incapacitated - we had issues getting MIL into FIL's life admin when he died unexpectedly 3 years ago.

We have separate accounts for individual stuff - such as HR stuff from work, job applications and separate work emails.

We also have a shared shopping gmail acc where all the spam / offers generated by online purchasing goes - so it doesn't fill up the other email inboxes which are reserved largely for interacting with humans / receiving emails we need to see (rather than thousands of special offers).

Joint emails and, especially, Facebook accounts screams 'one of us has had an affair and needs keeping an eye on ' to me.

Yes, but just for anything child related, joint account, mortgage related etc. We both have personal emails for our individual bank accounts, doctors, online shopping etc.

No way! I don’t know anyone who does this. I do know a couple with a joint Facebook account and I hate messaging them because I don’t know which one is going to read it.

A loooong time i had a joint email address, it would just irritate me.

I have a joint one with DH for child/house stuff. We’re in our 30s.

I find it very useful to both have access to utility bills, school emails etc. we work well as a team so I will pick up certain things say lawyer emails for house move and he picks up stuff from the accountant.

I have my own personal email address as does he. DH isn’t controlling!

Exactly this ^

All the house-related stuff (bills etc) go to the joint email account, then anything personal goes to our individual ones. It seemed like the most logical way of serting things up donkeys years ago when we moved in together.