to think that it's rude to assume people's shortened name?

[Herts6789]

Semi lighthearted - i know there are bigger issues at the moment but being relatively new in my job and working from home seem to have exaggerated this!

At work my email address is my long name (that no one calls me except my mum)

My short name is not the default short name for this long name. I call myself my short name when I introduce myself and sign off every email with it. Its three letters its not hard and it's not an unusual name.

It annoys me when people who haven't met me email me with the wrong first name (they've just assumed it from my full name in the email address)
It annoys me even more when people who I have had several email exchanges with and introduced myself in person, still call me the wrong name!

I wouldn't dream of emailing someone called Susan 'Hi Sue' for example, unless they had called themselves Sue first.

I find it awkward to call out (but have done twice now in one week) and I also have asked work to change my email address to my short name but apparently they cant.

YANBU - it's rude to assume peoples names, or not take the care to address them the way they address themselves

YABU - I am being oversensitive

Normally I'd agree but it's your email address. It's obvious why people would assume.

I get called the diminutive of my name sometimes. Well, only once. Always by men who think they get to make me small and cute. They don't.

I go by my full first anme and have always hated it when people shorten it - I never have. I find the shortened names that can be used patronising and hate them. I would nver choose them for myself.

It makes my work colleagues laugh when I call and leave a message only for them to be told that called them.

I can never work out why it's some people's default!

Just so I'm getting this straight...

your email address is something like : [email protected]

your preferred shortening is something like : Bertie

but people are calling you : Bobbie
on first interaction, regardless of how you sign yourself off in emails?

That's a bit weird!

@Kittykarate exactly that.

@mrsterrypratchet I don't mind people calling me by my long name that's in the email address. That is my name of course. I take issue with people assuming what the shortened version of it should be and calling me that, even after i have addressed myself differently.

Oooooh. Yeah that's annoying.

I understand totally. The equivalent for me is for E.g. my full name being Victoria. I always refer to myself as Victoria. Sign emails as Victoria. Everyone else calls me Victoria. Then someone will just start calling me Vicky. Which I hate.

I had this another person same name in dept, used the shortening. I started and I didn't. Then everyone still shortened it rather than me being Joanne and her being Jo. I used to get the rage, but correcting people is impossible without looking like a moody bitch and pissing people off. I sort of accept it now, but it feels like someone else as I don't identify as a Jo. Hadn't really happened much previously had a past issue with being called Joanna a lot, but I worked in an Italian office then and they seem to like A ending names.

Yes, I think it's rude to assume.

I went to university with an "Alexandra". She said that she didn't even like "Alex" as a shortened version of her name, but had grown to accept that her actual name clearly had too many syllables for most people to cope with and she'd just have to live with it. It's made me very careful about not using shortened versions of a name, unless the person themselves introduces themselves using it.

YANBU. I absolutely hate my name being shortened. And shortening it turns it to a males name which makes me hate it even more. It’s always usually people I don’t know very well or met a couple of times that do it too! I’ve never referred to myself as this name and no one I know shortens it so it instantly pees me off!

My name is the same as several well known celebrities that all use the shortened version. Like ie: 'Bev' instead of 'Beverly' ( not my name) I don't like 'bev' and never have. I always introduce myself as Beverly and most of those in any official capacity use that. A lot of my friends however, insist on using the short version Bev, and as they are friends it seems petty to me to ask them to call me Beverly. My DH calls me Beverly but also says it is too long as it has three sylables !! I sometimes feel that I should use Bev but I love my full name.

It is rude, but it's not the crime of the century.

I'll always call someone by their "proper" name per their email and after that be led by how they sign off. But if someone used an abbreviation of my name it wouldn't annoy me too much.

What I find really difficult is that I have a number of clients which go by completely different names to their email. Because their email is their first name but they go by their middle name. So for example I have a [email protected] but she hates Jane and has to be called Alexandra.

There are far more of these people around than is reasonable. Especially when talking to one of my colleagues. "Oh I sent those off to John today." "Who's John?" "John Doe?" "Oh, you mean Simon"... And on it goes!

Abbreviations are nothing compared to this sort of headache

When I've called people out and say I prefer my full name, they say they are just being friendly. I don't get it when often I've not met them in real life. It's also pretty awkward after I bring it up.

I've also noticed that short names get ie / y added to them. It happens to both my children. So if you named your child just Ben it gets turned to Benny or Teddy. It's the weirdest thing.

My name is Louise. My first and second line managers call me Lou. Some random on email today called me Lou. My email address says Louise, I sign myself off as [Professional title] Louise Surname. I fucking hate being called Lou, it just makes me think of toilets (with apologies to everyone who likes being called Lou). I even had a tutor on a professional course, after inputs on how to address the public, call me Lou even though it said Louise on my name plate. Drives. Me. Mad.

And now I have to name change!

I agree.

@notoneday I have this too, I also work for an Italian company and they can't seem to understand, for example, Isabelle not Isabella, I actually wish I'd just called myself the A ending name rather than the E! Even though my email address and sign off is the E spelling.

So Annoying!

Make sure they don't know the long version of your name - change email address, etc. Then they won't know what it's short for.

@StraightOuttaCamden I've been told the A ending is feminine so we are obviously just manly  ha I even said to our VP you know my names not Joanna and he said yes but I don't like it. So for example I introduce myself as Joanne and do a presentation and then he'd say any questions for Joanna

Ah, I have a variant on this. I have a shortish name that does have a shortening. Whenever people use the shortening it's usually because we're properly friendly. Or they know another one and therefore go straight in with the shortened version.

If it's the former I find it really sweet. I worked with my boss for ten years before he used it!

I also know 2 Amanda's neither are Mandys. One goes by Mand to friends and family. They both bristle is someone calls them mandy.

I think it's an attempt by people to sound friendly, but more often than not you don't want them to be your friend.

I had this with someone I had a meeting with not long ago. I use my full name so introduced myself as Janet, not my real name, but as soon as we sat down the first thing she said was 'would you like a coffee Jan?'.

No one calls me 'Jan', it isn't me. I had a sort of 'who's she talking to?' moment, but couldn't bring myself to correct her as I know she was trying to create a friendly feeling but it just made me feel irritated by her.

It wasn't even as if she'd only seen my full name on the official forms we were filling in and assumed I might like to have my name shortened. I told her my name and still she didn't get it right, which made me feel that she probably wasn't actually listening to me properly.

Actually, come to think of it, she had to pass my email address onto a third party and left a small part of it off, which caused quite a problem one way and another. So she probably wasn't listening properly.

I don't mind close friends abbreviating my name but it gets my goat when someone I've only just met decides to call me eg "Vicky" if my name was Victoria. I think you only get to mess with my name when you know me well enough! Otherwise it's an overfamiliarity that I don't like.
"Hi, I'm Rosalind, pleased to meet you"
"Hi, Roz, I'm Jezza!" Er no, I've introduced myself by the name I'd like you to call me thank you.

I think it's because they think using your full name will sound too formal and sets an unfriendly tone.

There is a common abbreviation for my name but I've never used it. At the age of fifty I found myself renamed because a friendly colleague decided to shorten my name and now everyone uses it, including me!

I wouldn't let it bother me, I would correct them at the end of the email "btw, for future reference it's xxxx" and hope they remember.

Urgh I feel you pain. I think you just have to politely correct them. I usually go with "sorry I think you might have confused me with someone else, I am x and my job is y". This works well in big organisations where stuff is by email.

My name is one that is commonly a shortened name but it's my full name- e.g. Alex.
A new woman started in my dept called Alexandra and now we are both inexplicably referred to as "Alexandra H and Alexandra R"
It drives me up the wall!

My issue is people who correct the spelling of my name.

I have a standard, boring English name but because I was born overseas, it was recorded by a non native English speaker and has a single letter different to the standard spelling.

Even when I have emailed someone and typed my name, they still reply with it spelt "correctly". So annoying.

DS name is a shortened version, i.e Josh and every now and then people call him Joshua. His name isn’t Joshua, it’s Josh and I tell them this.

Yes yes yes.

And spelling it wrong. You’ve replied to my email which has it in THREE places. Quite how you can then spell it incorrectly when replying to me is beyond me.