to keep insisting that the school uses our correct names?

[Aika]

When we married both my husband and I kept our maiden names, him remaining Mr X and me - Ms Y. Our daughter's name is Miss Y-X.

When filling school applications we (obviously) used correct names for all of us, however, the school seems to be very confused and keeps calling my husband either Mr Y or Mr Y-X. At first, we giggled and asked them verbally to change it. Then we called them several times and wrote increasingly more aggressive emails. Yet, every couple of weeks we receive a new letter with a new version of our names, except for the correct one. The latest was the best - Mr and Mrs Firstname Y-X.

My husband used to laugh, but now he takes offence at paying large bills with a wrong name on them.

I am probably being unreasonable, but one would have thought that in the 21st century people should be able to deal with wives and husbands having different names?

My motto in most things nowadays is pick your battles. This seems a silly and pointless one to pick really. Why give yourself a coronary over something like this? Does it really make any difference?

I disagree. It's a name, it's the OP's name and they should get it right.

I am Ms X. DH is Mr Y.

The kids have X as a middle name and Y as a surname.

We get every combination of names, often misspelt.

I think it is poor form they can't get it right, but actually my name was always misspelt before I was married too, so it all just forms part of the same general annoyance. My own cousins spell my name wrong as does my oldest friend who came to my first birthday party!

People get names wrong. It is not personal to you nor to your choice of surname. You alone can decide how annoyed to be about it.

(and no, my name is not particularly weird nor outlandish nor uncommon).

schools are busy dealing with educating our children , does it matter what they call you.

slightly disturbed you have sent them increasingly aggressive emails.

poor school

You're not being remotely unreasonable.

If they are billing you, it is important they use the correct names. It can be no end of hassle if you have bills in the wrong name.

If you were separated or divorced, would they really still do this?

It's extremely ignorant to assume this is only a matter of you being picky or inconvenient - if you get a bill in the wrong name, it might matter quite a lot. I have recently had to demonstrate my outgoings for tax purposes and if I'd put them in a name I've never legally used, I could have been done for fraud. I'm surprised so many posters seem to imagine that doesn't matter - or maybe they don't realize that legal names are actually quite important.

countrykitten

good idea, but we are on direct debit )))

They seem to have a few different databases because we keep getting variations to the names. What's funny is that once every term they send us a letter asking to confirm that they hold correct information and every term we send back the form with the corrections - that's in addition to emails and verbal pleas.

I think the poster suggesting they are doing to wind us up might be onto something.

How can your husband have a "maiden" name?

MardyBraWouldDoEddieRedmayne

Ah! You noticed

She means his name from before he was married, I think, mardy. Archaic usage.

Actually, AIBU that so many people read my OP literally vis-a-vis 'aggressive' emails?

AIBU to be surprised that so many people read my OP literally vis-a-vis 'aggressive' emails?

Are your emails getting to the right person? Possibly your clarification of name hasn't found it's way to the person that produces the invoices?
I think you are right to be miffed. It doesn't take much trouble to get someone's name correctly recorded in the accounts system.

But doesn't "maiden" apply to women LRD? i.e. when a woman was a maiden before she got married and was ravished by her husband. Or maybe there is something we don't know about the OP's DH.

idiot55 I see your point, but how can I trust them to get my daughter's education right if they can't get such a simple thing?

Mardy We are an equal opportunity household )))

"AIBU to be surprised that so many people read my OP literally vis-a-vis 'aggressive' emails?"

Don't you know that every word you use on AIBU will be analysed and speculated upon for at several pages? Not that I know from bitter experience or anything...

there's no point sending more emails, send a regular, formal letter, keep it brief

Is there a male equivalent to a maiden? Virgin/bachelor name, maybe?

Maiden used to be gender-neutral.

If you can accept that a lot of people don't remember everyone they've met, it completely throws me normally if I see some people out of context, you have to accept that not everywhere is going to get your names right.

It being an admin thing you'd think the people putting the information in would take it straight off the source they're reading it from, but it's possible they could be trying to make sense of what they're seeing and think it must be wrong because of all the different names in your family.

They're trying to follow the 'rules' of what usually happens in a family and if you choose not to follow them (which is of course totally your right) you shouldn't really come down too hard on the people just trying to do the job as best they can. (although I acknowledge it must be incredibly frustrating after the zillionth time of telling them and the computer says nooo)

Mardy

What have I done?

My DH had a 'maiden' name too as we stuck them together after we married since I didn't want just his and he didn't want just mine so the compromise was that we both have both. The DCs have both too.

YANBU. I think that it is one of the basic courtesies of life to get people's names right, especially in the context of a constituency like a school where there are established relationships. So I would keep correcting them politely.

It does seem to me that it indeed may be a database problem. If so, they should look into upgrades to deal with the problem; it may be a simple enough fix.

BTW, DH and I also kept our maiden names when we married.

Stuff seems to get onto databases and it's impossible to get it off, we haven't used our landline phone for years, but trying to get it off the dentist/doctor/schools databases is a nightmare!

I've never given it to DD1s secondary school, but they still leave (quite important) messages on it's answer phone and didn't call my mobile

AgentZigzag

This is all perfectly understandable. What I don't understand is why they need to 'try to make sense' when they have a form in front of them in block capitals? Or an email? And our names are really very very simple.