Over familiar receptionists

[MoralDefective]

My dentist always phone the day before an appointment to remind us(they do this to all patients..not just us)....when i answer the phone they always ask for me by my first name and i think it's rude and always say 'this is Ms'.....my car insurers (swinton) did the same this week.......when the Dr comes out to call in the next patient they always use the persons first name, yet they expect to be called by their title and surname ie Dr Smith.......am i just being petty....it seems so disrespectful,especially when they are speaking to much older/elderly people.

I hate it.

When calling dr etc, I always say "Hello. This is Mrs X.."

I also do not like to be called by my first name by children.

My next door neighbours children do it and I HATE it. I make my lads call neighbour Mrs Y and refer to the neighbours on the other side as Mr and Mrs Z but she never takes the hint. Not even when I make a point of calling my husband Mr X when talking about him to them. (the children)

When the lads schoolfriends ask me what my name is, I always say Mrs X." in what I hope is a very firm tone

And what I hate most of all is how elderly people are called by their first name in a tone of voice that is normally reserved for small children. Really gets my goat.

Mibby - I can understand that one - my drama teacher used to call me Donna all the time and could never understand why I got stroppy at him after 2 years in his class and telling him every time that my name is not Donna!

I had an appointment with a consultant called Mr Peter Parker ( NOT spider man BTW)

When I went in to see him he said hello and called me by my first name and introduced himelf as Mr Parker

So I said hello Peter, he went a bit red and saidactually I prefer my patients to call me Mr Parker, to which I replied and I INSIST my Doctors call me Mrs @@@@@@@

You should have seen his face, the nurse stood there open mouthed with shock I dont think anybody had EVER spoken to him like that.

pompous so and so.

I also today had to tell the chap from my contact lense supplier twice to call me Mrs @@@@@@

I worked at First direct and we were told to only call the customers by the first name if permission had been expressed! they would have kicked our butts if we had taken it upon ourselves to do it!

You know what I hate? When they ask you "May I call you ?" It just seems rude to say "No, I would prefer you to call me Mrs X", you know? "Yes" is just the expected answer.

If I was brave enough I'd say no.

I wonder if anyone ever has said no.

YANBU.

Telesales people ringing u and saying Hi, Susan (Not my real name!), how are you today? really make my blood boil!!

But also I can't imagine being in the Doctor's waiting room and hearing calls for Amanda, Daphne, or whatever. there's no way I would call my doctor anything other than 'Doctor', and I an't imagine ringing the surgery and asking for Steve or whatever. In fact , come to think of it I have no idea what his first name is.

I agree that Mrs blahblah is MIL, so I always call myself Firstname Surname.

ringing up

not into teenspeak yet!

I couldn't care less UNLESS the other person insists on being called Mr/Mrs/Miss/Ms X and calling me by my first name.

HectateQueenOfWitches

I have said NO several times - they dont like it and I have had a lot of spluttering
and red faces.

I sat in a meeting with care providers
discussing my elderly parents, first of all
they referred to me and my sisters by our first name and I corrected them, this is Mrs @@@@ I am Mrs @@@@ and so on.

Then when they referred to my parents by their first names I corrected them they were told they were not to call my parents by their first names and that included verbally and in writing.

Oh they so hated me in that meeting.

I work in an op theatre and part of my job is dithering with the monitoring and checking for allergies, I always introduce myself as Jane Smith, and ask them if they prefer to be called Mr White.

Some say no love call me Barry and others just say yes Mr White is fine.

I think it's important to at least have your dignity if you're in a vulnerable position.

Back to OP, do you say 'yes, this is Mrs Smith' to give them a gentle hint?

Hecate - I've noticed my American friends are better at this - they say 'let's keep it formal' and that seems to work.

I always find it strange because virtually no-one calls me by my first name except strangers (I hate it!).

'let's keep it formal'.....that sounds like a good way to go......HECTATE..i can't agree more....it's like these people are infantilising us so that we don't argue and make their lives easier...ggrrr...i am a grown up in RL....really

Snailwhale...yes i do say that...'yes,this is Ms Smith,can i help you....'etc

When I call patients over the tannoy at work I always call them by firstname surname - if I called just Mr Jones or Mrs Baker potentially I could have 3 people walk in to my room!

I always call patients Mr or Mrs Whatever though initially, then ask them what they like to be called if I'm going to be seeing them again.

When I worked for a large high street chemist they insisted all the pharmacists wore name badges and a few years back changed them all from Mrs Xxxx, MRPharmS to first name, Pharmacist. When everybody complained about the informality, professionalism, etc we were told first names are now used for security reasons. Apparently it is a lot harder to track, stalk or whatever from a first name than form a surname.

Still not sure I believe it but that was the story!

I understand that....Mrs Jane Smith...Mr John Jones.....BUT not Jane or John....just good manners really.

Heck no, if I called firstname only it would be chaos! I can just imagine having 7 Johns trotting into my treatment room then me trying to establish just which one is due to be seen!

It's also disrespectful to assume a person wants to be called by their first name alone.

I hate people being obsessive about being called Mr or Mrs, just seems pompous and ridiculous.

I don't feel like Mrs X at all I am totally my firstname. Hate hate hate Mrs X.

I call my dentist, dr etc by their first name as well!

I never, ever use first names when talking to members of the public, unless specifically asked to do so, (I work in adult and elderly social care) and even then I find it uncomfortable.

Our team considers it very dis-respectful, and even amongst ourselves we talk about Mr or Mrs Bloggs, only using the first name when we have to, and to avoid confusion.

YANBU. It's an equality issue. If the doctor invites me to use their first name and is happy for receptionists to use their first name I'd be perfectly happy for them to use my first name. It's never happened like that though. To use my first name whilst expecting me to address them with a title assumes I am their subordinate and is rude. It really winds me up. It is not friendly it is disrespectful. Not sure if it's the doctors who want it like that or the receptionists though. At the end of the day I think it's because they think they are doing us such an enormous favour because the NHS is free at the point of delivery. They forget it's not actually free at all and we are the customer and if it wasn't free at the point of delivery they would have to be a bit politer or their bill wouldn't be paid. Doesn't happen when I pop down to the local private hospital - funny that!

I thought of this thread this morning when a girl rang me from some company or other.

she needed to talk to me as the owner of the business and asked me my name I said "Andrea Don", expected her to clarify that's what I said and perhaps call me Ms Don or ask what I preferred. No, she didn't even clarify the surname, she just said "okay, Andrea..." I was very annoyed at that - I don't mind being called by my first name, because Ms Don just sounds very formal, and not me, but I like to know that they know what my full name is, and to ask what to call me to my face!

I'm having the dilemma in choir now, because we've got a new junior chorister, and when I introduced myself, I didn't know whether I should say Ms Don and call the choirmaster Mr Payne (i'm now the junior choir trainer), but it just sounded so odd, because all the adults call each other by their first names, just to have one child call us Mr, Ms, Mrs. I'm sure I'd feel different if we had more children (maybe )

last time we had children, one girl was the daughter of the woman DH was seeing, so in social situations she called him FirstName and in choir she called him Mr Payne. It was funny, but correct, obviously.

Still, look on the bright side. Try a language with multiple registers, where verbs change when talking to your boss, your husband, your friends or your children.

See here

I think a lot of this is a generational thing. I absolutely hate being called miss XXX, that just doesn't feel like me! It rarely comes up because most people automatically use my first name, which is just fine by me. I don't like children referring to me as Miss XXX either, I always tell them to use my first name if they do.

The only people I can remember calling Mr or Mrs/Ms/Miss are my teachers and that stopped when I was in 6th form (at the teachers request). Having said that I don't work in a place where I have to deal with people I don't know regularly. I probably would speak more formally if it was a complete stranger.

I love when Waitrose tannoy their staff, they always use Mrs X etc.