is this sexist or am I over thinking things?

[WidowWadman]

My husband and I are buying our first home. I'm earning a bit more than him, the deposit is coming out of my inheritance, I've been doing all correspondance with our conveyancer (including the initial instruction), so why am I named second on all paperwork? It doesn't make a difference on a practical level as we're joined tenants anyway, but somehow it really pisses me off, that he's "buyer1" and I'm "buyer2" on everything. Can't be even based on alphabetical name order so I wonder if it's based on sex?

AIBU to be annoyed?

We had a leaflet from our UKIP candidate through the post yesterday, addressed to DH.

They must have got his name from the electoral roll, but I'm on it too and they didn't send me a leaflet. Womens' suffrage has clearly slipped their minds...

YANBU. We didn't put my DH on our mortgage as he was on fixed term contract and mortgage broker repeatedly quizzed me on my decision to use "Ms" rather than Mrs and that I hadn't changed my name. Like he phoned me up specifically to query it. I felt like I was back in the 1980s!

And while we're on the subject... I have yet to fill in a school or NHS form that didn't assume all children have two heterosexual parents. I'm particularly at the school, which could so easily alter its own forms.

I didn't realise this kind of thing went on!

We are unmarried and everything is just in my name.

Easy.

Was quizzed by young whippersnapper mortgage broker about why DH and I have different surnames after I phoned to ask why my name on all the paperwork had been changed from Miss to Mrs Myname

Nationwide put my name first on joint account correspondence (alphabetically it would be second). It's one reason I'm loyal to them! Most other things I am named first because I am the person who deals with it. I think having different surnames helps, most organisations probably assume we're not married.

YANBU OP, sadly it's just another part of the casual everyday sexism that goes on.

You are definitely overthinking things. That's just the traditional way it's done. While it IS a leftover thing from the days before women enjoyed full equality with men, it's continued existence doesn't make it sexist. If you look at this practically - Someones name has to come first, it makes sense therefore that it just stays the way it is - After all, if you demanded it be changed to Mrs and Mr Smith, men would be demanding to know they were being place second too.

YANBU. It's sexist. I had a similar experience when I added DH to my bank account to make it joint. Suddenly the bank letters were addressed with his name first even though he was technically a sub-account holder to me! Also when we took out house insurance on MY house that was in my name only (although we both lived there as our permanent residence) he was named first on the insurance documents even though he didn't even own the bloody house .

And one time when I called up to query something about the insurance they wouldn't talk to me as I wasn't the primary person named in the insurance documents!! Utterly infuriating. I complained at the time but it didn't seem to make an impact. These are all great examples of everyday sexism. We are totally within our rights to question these things but by doing so we become 'difficult' or we're 'making a fuss'. So frustrating....

Now the situation has resolved because we have switched roles after having DC so now DH is the main breadwinner while I am a SAHM. Everything is set up to intrinsically fit that model it seems. So much for progress!

Of course it matters, Burke1. And not just because of the principle, but it also can have practical implications, like, as somebody above posted, when the woman wasn't eligible for the building society windfall payouts because her name wasn't first. Or when a woman can't deal with it over the phone because they need to speak to her husband/partner (as happened to several posters on here) - a particular problem if it's an abusive relationship. Or what if a couple split up, who has control over the situation then? And also, if an account/bill is just in the husband's/partner's name you can't use it as proof of address, e.g. for DBS.

Saying 'that's just the traditional way it's done' is just such a lame excuse. There have been so many examples on this thread when it was actually the woman who dealt with everything and it's still her partner/husband who is on the paperwork. It's utter rubbish.

I don't really see why anyone would care if it makes no difference to anything! I probably would of done this too without even thinking about it and if someone hasn't thought about it, therefore it wasn't intentional, it can't really be sexist!

Interesting reasoning, NurseRoscoe. I challenge you to think about stuff like this from now on, and see if you think it's sexist.

" if someone hasn't thought about it, therefore it wasn't intentional, it can't really be sexist!"

That's just plain wrong. A lot of sexism/racism/homophobia etc is unthinking and automatic. It's still wrong.

If correspondance is automatically addressed to the man, just because he's male, and regardless of who applied or whose account it is, or alphabetical order, that's sexist. It's just another example of how women are seen as second place and of less importance. Little things quickly mount up.

aubergine, that's very interesting... although I'm not sure it's true. We're in Scotland, and in our first house purchase there was no issue with my name being first. But the second time, this happened to us. It introduced a delay in our purchase because they had to redo all the paperwork -- I was the sole earner and DH, in addition to no income at the time, was an international student and had no national insurance number either. They had to redo the forms because Buyer 1 must have an NI number.

burke, what's wrong with whatever order the couple fills the form out in? The same result with less effort -- what do they do when people with androgynous or perhaps foreign and not-well-known-for-gender names? Who would go first for (heterosexual couple) Leslie and Eleanor, for example? What would happen if they got it "wrong"?

nurse, it doesn't have to be on purpose to be sexist. That's the point of casual or unconscious sexism. It just happens because that's the way it's always been or how the culture is, and the participants don't even notice. When I'm given an appointment with a new GP, Dr So-and-so and naturally envisage her as male because culturally I've seen more male doctors on TV entertainment and in real life, that's sexism it doesn't mean I'm sexist. I'm a product of the inherent cultural sexism in which I live. The only way to get rid of this sort of thing is to challenge it when it happens, because otherwise people go on not noticing and it perpetuates. (Personally, after recognising that I was mildly surprised at my GP's gender, I've tried to remind myself, hey, that person could be female or male in a reverse situation -- although sometimes it's not even conscious so the only time you notice is at the surprise. So I try to pay attention to those surprises and work to reprogramme.) I believe they have done research to show that simply being aware of inherent cultural biases and watching out for them leads to less bias in things like hiring for jobs.

So thoughtless sexism isn't sexism? In my case someone must have made the conscious decision to swap my husband and me around, because having done all the paperwork and admin around it myself I know that they didn't follow the order of how I named us. So how can that be done unintentional. I remember the mortgage broker listing me as buyer 1 on the application because I'm the higher earner, and the deposit came from me, but the deed document still put me as buyer 2.

FWIW, the majority of everyday sexism is probably of the thoughtless variety. Doesn't make it any less riling though.

I'm in an occupation which means I regularly have to fill in forms on behalf of couples. I fill the names in on the basis that the person who is dealing with me comes first, and in practice that is most frequently the woman. I'm glad to say that it seems to be accepted by the people the forms go to without any difficulty.

Oh for god sake, as a conveyancer I can assure you it makes no difference and is certainly not sexism. Your conveyancer will have no idea you're the high earner, or care. They are not involved in that side of things. It will be either be the way you completed the forms or a force of habit of one of the conveyancers, not necessarily yours as the sellers conveyancer drafts the contract. By all means ask for the paperwork to be changed, you will look like an idiot.
As a side note, I've had more that a couple of women complain to me over the years that they were put down as client 1 and not their husband. A few men complain about the same thing. You can't win, someone has to be client one.

I've actually bee very impressed with how this happens less these days. But it's still infuriating when it does.

On a positive note, I had to ring out insurance company (Aviva) to add my car to our existing car insurance for dh's car. I am named driver but obviously insurance is in his name. The woman didn't even blink. I had to confirm security details and it helped that dh has started the application online but in ten minutes my car was added, and all was sorted. I couldn't remember who is the official owner of my car and she said that as we are married and at the same address it doesn't actually matter.

So some good news at least.

Tbh I've found it to be random! I used to be annoyed that when my partner moved into my house and I added him onto the council tax that they would put him first on correspondence but now that we jointly own a property it comes addressed to me first. When we started having Joint finances I added him to my existing bank account and statements still come addressed to mrs a & mr b xxxxx

If you were on MN in 2011 you'd have been AMAZED at how many women filled in the census form and put themselves as "person 2" automatically.

We had something similar when I had done all paperwork and paying for something (a holiday maybe?) And yet all correspondence was to dh. On the other hand, dss' s school went through a phase of only writing to his dm about admissions even though he lives with his dad and dad had done all paperwork etc. This led to him missing important day. Finally he was asked to provide proof of pr. So I guess it goes both ways. Unsatisfactory either way.

teddy how do you feel about what happened to me then? My husband was not on the paperwork at all, yet correspondence was addressed to him.

And of course it matters! This stuff indicates cultural norms, norms that continually inform us of how we should behave. I work in a job where people are often surprised that I'm female. I'm sure they don't mean to be sexist, but it is part of a societal norm that says woman don't do this type of job. And that matters when trying to get girls to recognise fields they'd be interested in.

"force of habit" IS the problem. That shows the ingrained sexism in the society, not necessarily of the individual. That's the harder sexism to fight because you can't make the person who does it the "bad guy" and people want there to be a bad guy, and don't want to admit their own unconscious biases are also part of the problem. Only with everyone challenging their own biases will we be able to get rid of this type of sexism entirely.

Moreis, that sounds like incompetence rather than sexism. No solicitor would try to contact an unnamed party to a transaction intentionally. Its a breach of data protection and they could have got in to a lot of trouble.

Highest earner gets written down so not sexist its wageist! . New word alert...

It sounds like sexist incompetence. The two are far from mutually exclusive.