To be angry HR made this (relatively minor) assumption?

[SpaceCadet4000]

My DH and I got married last August. I made the decision to keep my surname and continue to use the title Ms. I don't mind if other people choose to change their name, but I personally am uncomfortable with the historical and gendered connotations of name changing. This have never been an issue- I just select the Ms box when filling in forms, and I don't shout about it to other people.

However, I have recently started a new job. On my second day I went for my induction with HR where they collected details about my next of kin (mentioned it was my husband as they needed the relationship stated), whether I wanted a pension, my NI number etc. All fairly innocuous, and actually very little form filling on my part, and certainly no disclosure of my title.

As I joined close to payday I received my pay check late through the post- it's addressed to Mrs Space Cadet. This suggests that the HR advisor has clearly assumed I'm a Mrs based on our conversation.

It's minor, and I assume fairly quick to rectify, but I feel really angry that someone else has made this decision about me. I'm no special snowflake, but I'm dismayed that my identity has been so casually undermined. The office culture is fairly conservative, so I also feel like I'll be judged as an SJW for asking for it to be changed.

AIBU to just email them and ask for it to be changed?

[angielou123]

It's annoying when things like this happen. Slightly off topic, but what I hate is when the school send a letter home. I am a single mum but my kids have their dad's surname. I fill out all the personal info forms required by the school so they know im Miss xxxx but they address me as Mrs (kids surname). Trivial but annoying nonetheless.

[POTC]

Personally I hate it when people make me a Ms rather than Miss! Can't stand the Ms title and have never asked for it, always state I'm Miss, so why because I'm past a certain age and have children do people assume I want to be something else?!

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

I was wondering that. I don't think I've ever told an employer if I'm married or not. I've told them who to contact in an emergency. I don't recall telling them what my relationship was to that person. The current one is my husband. Some of my partners know what my marital status some don't. HR definitely don't.

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

I fill out all the personal info forms required by the school so they know im Miss xxxx but they address me as Mrs (kids surname). Trivial but annoying nonetheless

It's not trivial. We are a couple but all correspondence was to Ms My Name an Mr His Name.The class list would have been a nightmare for the poster who thinks it's important to let the world know your children are born in wedlock. Mr and Mrs same name were in the minority compared to the number of Drs, Profs who were partnered with Mr , Ms and Miss of different names.

[Viviennemary]

Just send them an e-mail stating how you wish to be known. They aren't mindreaders.

[FrameyMcFrame]

I'm not even married and I'm known as Mrs in one of my places of work, because I have kids... So I must be a MRS
Bleurgh. Pees me off

[AgentPineapple]

YANBU to ask them to change it, however as you say you didn't specify your title and you told them you were married so they ANBU to assume your title is Mrs.

Think you have over reacted to a simple and easy to fix mistake.

I was married 18 months ago, I did change my name as it has no connotations for me, but on a lot of things I am still Miss and then my new surname. I have never felt the need to correct it, it's just not a big deal...

[ToucheShay]

Bertrand, you're needed....

I thinks she's busy fighting the cause on another thread (about a nursery rhyme fgs)

[AgentPineapple]

Ingrained sexism, utter nonsense. You have become insulted and aggravated by something that most people choose to do.

[TakeItFromMe]

Wow. I hope you never have a REAL issue to worry about

[lorelei9here]

Thanks Touché
I found that one too depressing to tackle after I looked at the first few replies. Big up to Bertrand I say!

[BertrandRussell]

There is a post on here which includes the words "hussy""proud to be married" and "having children in wedlock". Has there been a rift in the space/time continuum?

[lorelei9here]

Bertrand, the majority of this thread has made me wonder when we reverted back to 1916. thank you for phrasing your posts so well.

[magratvonlipwig]

I write this as someone who has worked on payroll.
Sometimes the software demands an answer , you have 200 people in your payroll, there's a deadline, and you think married ladies title is probably Mrs.
So you put it in and carry on.

It's not undermining your identity and most people I know would be happy to change it if you let them know your preference.

I think you're over reacting a bit.
It's probably no big deal to change it.

[EBearhug]

magrat, why isn't Ms the default for any woman whose preference you don't know?

[Serenitymummy]

Ah magratvonlipwig, thank you! I'm a payroll processor and have to say that when I'm punching in new starters details day in, day out, the safe assumption is Mrs if you know the employee is married as in this case, or Ms if it's unknown. You are definitely in the minority OP that you're married, haven't taken the title Mrs, AND are bothered by what is on your payslip. I can honestly say that in 12 years of doing this job I can count on one hand the number of people that have asked me to change their title. And they were all Mr instead of Ms or vice versa, and mostly noticed by a manager handing out payslips rather than the employee themself getting pissed about it.

Also, payroll won't care if you send them an email and ask them to amend it, that's a ten second job that they won't give a second thought to, so just do it!

[ToucheShay]

Has the OP been back with an update?

[Serenitymummy]

Oh, and to the person who has it too and is 'wound up every month when you receive your payslip' why not take 30 seconds to send an email/make a call to have it corrected?! Sheesh!!!!!

[magratvonlipwig]

Ebearhug
I would say just as many if not more people don't like ms.
Neither are wrong.
But tradition lends us towards Mrs and it's easily fixed if you dont want that.

[LassWiTheDelicateAir]

There is a post on here which includes the words "hussy""proud to be married" and "having children in wedlock". Has there been a rift in the space/time continuum?

You are on roll here Bertrand

[HarlotBronte]

Several have actually Harlot! I'm "letting the side down" according to one poster, I'm preventing another from "having an ambiguous title" etc etc!

Sorry for the late reply tessabelle, but you're wrong to conflate these two things you mention. You and women who choose to use Mrs to denote marriage ARE part of what's preventing other women from having a neutral title. That's just a fact. Just as, if every unmarried woman started using Mrs too, they'd be preventing you from having a title denoting your marital status because it would stop meaning what you want it to mean. As discussed upthread, when you use a title to signify something, you're reliant on enough people playing along for it to work. The choices we all make about titles impact on the choices others can make. You can like this or you can lump it, but it won't make it any less true and it won't give you the right not to hear it.

But it doesn't follow that the person pointing this fact out to you thinks you're letting the side down. Some of us try to hate the game not the player.

[Floggingmolly]

How does some people using Mrs. actually prevent anybody else using a neutral title? It prevents the neutral title being exclusively used, but so what?
Doesn't affect anybody else.

[HarlotBronte]

Covered this several times, but I'll go again:

It doesn't prevent people using Ms, but it does prevent it being neutral. Some of us want a neutral default, with no connotations about marital status or views, like men get with Mr. Ms isn't that, as this thread shows. It's intended to be, but while there are so many women choosing a title to indicate their marital status, or even their old marital status in the case of divorced women still using Mrs, it doesn't.

Basically, if you want a title to signify something, you're reliant on enough other people playing along for it to signify what you want it to. Not enough people do that to make Ms the equivalent of Mr. If all women did as I do and called themselves Ms regardless of marital status, it would be. Ergo, other women are stopping me from having my choice. The same argument works with all titles. If all women started using Mrs at a certain age, it would stop meaning a married woman. If half of married women used Mrs and half of single women did, it wouldn't mean much a t all. Those of you who want to call yourselves Mrs to show you're married wouldn't have that option if other women didn't play along in sufficient number- you could call yourself Mrs, but it wouldn't have the assumed meaning you want it to mean. If everyone started using Professor, it would cease being a title indicating that someone's in the higher reaches of academia, and if it were suddenly adopted by everyone with no academic qualifications at all, it would start to mean something quite different to what it does now.

[Floggingmolly]

Fair enough. It's your choice versus a completely different choice though, and yours doesn't necessarily carry more weight. If it did there wouldn't be an issue in the first place.

[HarlotBronte]

Yes, you'll see that I have been extremely careful during this thread not to say that other women should call themselves anything, or that anyone has the right to make that call for another adult. The problem I have is when people fetishise choice in itself and refuse to accept the implications their decisions have. We get a choice, we don't get one in a vacuum. People have every right to call themselves Mrs Husbandsname and not worry about what it does to me or any other woman, but what they don't get to do is silence others who mention the effects.