WWYD- Getting someone elses emails? (LIGHTHEARTED!!!!)

[WiddlinDiddlin]

I've been recieving someone elses emails for the better part of twenty years now.

Her email address is nameinitialsurname, and mine is just namesurname. The issue is our first names and her middle initial are such that its easy, so so easy to miss that initial.

Imagine JulieJJohnson or SophieESmith...

Most stuff I can ignore happily, updates on her car warranty, invites to church pot lucks. Some of it I nosey at, the frequent and detailed emails from her brother as he was on his missionary years (they are Mormons) overseas were actually interesting (if you're a nosey fucker as I am).

I have tried to contact her (I have found her on FB, she has ignored my message, I friend requested her so she'd be more likely to see my message, that was ignored too).

I have actually emailed back and forth with her DF.. he seems a nice guy.

I have replied to many emails - for example when I was sent the passwords and account details for the church bank account, and when I was sent sensitive information about her daughters school classes - to correct the error.

But the error continues to occur, either because she doesn't make it clear to people to include the initial in her email address or she allows people to write it out themselves and they mess up.

Yesterday I had to cancel a zoom meeting for an outpatient hospital appointment, there was no way to contact the sender (that I could find) to let them know I wasn't the right person, and that she would be unable to join the zoom. I could have fwd'd it to her actually... damn, didn't think of that.

Tonight I've just replied to a multi-person email chain (14 members of her family) discussing selling some personal items, to point out they or at least one of them, as her email address wrong ... and can they correct it!

I know too much about this other ladies life, and I feel a growing sense of responsibility about this... that I really do not want! It's been twenty fecking years!!!

What would you do?

DP suggested I should just join in and consider them family and see how long before someone bloody notices!

Eugh I have this too although it seems to have stopped but that might be as I stopped using that address. Dr info, friends, assorted mailing lists. I worked out they must have had a .net rather than .com or similar so did email her but still daily emails. Once I even got on a chain planning a holiday with a Group of friends so replied saying I'm not her but they all just continued to copy me into the conversation wondering what they would do about that...I blocked them all. She would also frequently request password resets so clearly didn't know her own email address. As I say I changed emails about 5 years ago and stopped using the other one so I assume if she wanted she could have it now but quite frankly I assume she's too stupid to realise.

I've had this too, with my maiden name email address. I know exactly where she lives, thanks to parcel tracking, and have e-receipts and the like from some places, Halfords being one.

I also found her on Facebook and messaged her, but she didn't respond. I just delete them / unsubscribe now.

If it's gmail you can automatically forward them to her. It's in Settings, Forwarding. I expect you can do this with most email providers.

Alternatively If you are annoyed now and just don't want to read them then you can filter them automatically into a folder and then every so often delete them in a batch.

The company I work for has the same name as a primary school. Our email is @name.org and the primary school email is @name.org.uk

I'm the "catch all" for email sent to our domain name. Usually it's just spam but I get a number of enquiries for the school including highly confidential things like medical documents and SEN assessments for children.

I was forwarding them onto the school, but every time I did, I got a rude response from the receptionist accusing me of snooping in confidential materials! I just delete them now.

I have this two! A lady in America. I get all their family photos, Christmas round robins, dog walking appointments, church clubs, etc.

I have this as well but I’ve always ignored the emails. One time the lady emailed me to ask if she could have my email address.

Nothing else you can do, I wouldn’t spend anymore time on it trying to fix. Just delete the emails or have a copy paste reply to say it’s the wrong address.

I get this too! I’ve had the other Louise bakers pay slips (she earns a LOT more than me!), waiver emails from cosmetic procedures, so many email confirmations from orders etc.
Ive contacted various places, sent an email to her employer but no response and still get the emails periodically!
Louise baker is not our real name!

I had this when I worked for a Church - our handyman would regularly transpose two digits when giving out his own email address and another similarly named man was getting a lot of his emails. Person 2 found our office phone number and called me to let me know as some of the stuff he’d received had been about Church accounts, so sensitive but not confidential information. Turned out he’d ben getting emails for years, including things like concert tickets and personal bank details. He was also the handyman for a business and they were very similar people! I persuaded person one to change his email address to something that was harder to get wrong.

I think I'd be inclined to tell the other person - by all the channels they use - that from a date (say 7 days from today) that all emails coming incorrectly to you will be auto deleted (can you do this if you set up a rule? If not just delete without reading.) You've been really helpful for the last TWENTY years - and they need to start taking responsibility for ensuring their correspondence reaches them or feel the consequences and not just ignoring you. 🌹

I wouldnt do anything. You have done everything you can to inform her and she has ignored you. You have told these people the email address is wrong and they still send. At this point I'd block them all as this all seems a bit weird to me.

Why would her DF still be emailing you knowing you are a complete stranger?- isnt that a little bit odd? Sorry but this would make me very suspicious of their motives.

Also, I wouldnt join in the conversation either- you could be accused of impersonating her, taking her identity etc

I have this twice over. Someone in Ireland and someone in the US. I get their medical appointments, classroom updates, tennis camp emails and flooring estimates.

Its a problem with Gmail dots

My sisters DP has this exact same problem. Say his email is MichaelThomas, there's another Michael who lives in America (I think he's from Texas), whose email is MichaelTomas.

Our Michael regularly gets emails for Texan Michael, of varying levels of importance. He was able to piece together the correct email from the contents of the messages "Dear Michael Tomas," etc, and get in touch with Texan Michael. He did get some acknowledgement, but it was rather rude and "Of course I give people the correct email!"

Nowadays, if it looks actually important, he forwards it to Texan Michael, if it doesn't, he deletes it.

I've had this too, and equally find it amusing. It's a Gmail glitch for some (if you own firstnamesurname you also own firsname.surname and surnamefirstname and surname.firstname) but others, like op, it's a typo.

I doubt it's a problem with gmail dots because someone else could not register a gmail address that was the string of letters that is your email address with any dots in anywhere.

So if you are lizsmith@gmail, you have also claimed l.i.z.s.m.i.t.h@gmail , liz.smith, liz.s.mith, l.i.zsmith etc. No-one else can have that as their email address.

They may incorrectly tell other people that their email is one of those, but it won't be.

I get ones that are reversed first and last name e.g. I'm lizsmith and the other person is smithliz but for some reason gives out their email address as lizsmith. It's usually obviously that person. I wouldn't know this from any of the emails I receive, but I have deduced it from replies and CCs.

It isn’t a problem with gmail dots. This comes up every time. It’s the sender putting in the wrong address. [email protected] is the same address as [email protected] or [email protected].

If [email protected] gives his email to someone who pays no attention to the M, the first John Smith will get it. Its user error on the sender’s part (and sometimes down to people who don’t know their own email address).

Google doesn’t send emails randomly to anyone who’s vaguely John Smith related though depending on how it feels.

I get this too. I have someone who thinks that their email address should be nice and easy as FirstnameLastname, and doesn't understand the logic that if someone already has that, they can't just have it. Early on, the other person attempted to 'take' my email account, by trying to go through the recovery process to reset passwords etc. After that I stopped being helpful. When she signs up for accounts, if the confirmation email includes a "this isn't me" link, I always follow it to unlink the address from the account. If it doesn't I will actually go into the account, reset the passwords and then delete the whole account.

if you own firstnamesurname you also own firsname.surname and surnamefirstname and surname.firstname

No you don't own the letters in a different order - how would that work? Gmail just ignores any dots in the string of text. It doesn't rearrange letters.

Every time this subject comes up I am rather surprised at how many people struggle to understand it.

No, it doesn’t ignore dots either. There is a set of characters that are legal for email addresses, and it will precisely match the address you supply to the one it delivers to.

If you try to send an email to an address that contains a character that is not in the legal set, it will tell you it’s an invalid address.

Gmail does ignore dots. Most other email providers do not and see it as a normal text character.
This has confused countless people...

I have a gmail address that people regularly get wrong because they miss out the initial before my last name. I have taken to spelling it out with spaces e.g. firstname a lastname and writing 'please note the third a before my last name'. In spite of this, my recent job offer went to the person without the extra initial.

Ah -
"Note: If you use Gmail through work, school or another organisation (such as yourdomain.com or yourschool.edu), dots do change your address."

So it varies depending on how you use gmail!
https://support.google.com/mail/answer/7436150?hl=en-GB

Because OP is her personal assistant after all....

Personally I'd just mark the address as spam so that they stop hitting your inbox then move on.

Gmail does ignore the dots sarasmith@gmail can also be s.a.rasmith@gmail

also you can use + I like using Janesmith+bills@gmail +dentist etc

… actually, it’s turns out I’m wrong! Google does in fact disregard all dots.

Most mail systems do not do this, but it turns out it’s part of the SMTP standard that the receiving system is allowed to interpret addresses how it likes.

Who knew…