Leaving job, work email registered on everything

[Bleepbleepbleepman]

Any tips??! Please
I’m likely leaving my longstanding job for a new one in the next few weeks
Historically (and stupidly) I’ve registered literally everything I’ve signed up for to my work email and phone number so I have easy access on my laptop and phone.
has anyone been in a similar situation and managed to navigate changing this smoothly?

you are being unreasonable - you’ve got a nightmare ahead sorting this

you are not being unreasonable - there’s a way to sort this

I'm gobsmacked that you thought that this was OK. It's very easy to create your own personal email address, so start today and update your personal details asap. Spend all day on it if you need to, and prioritise your bank and social media. All this could come to light when you leave when IT check over your laptop.

Using a work email address for social media accounts is a disciplinary offence where I work.

We don't have work mobiles as we have software on our laptops to make phone calls.

Why not ?

I am amazed that your employer allows this.

Setting up your internet banking, shopping accounts and all social media to a work email is incredibly stupid, imagine if OP had of been fired at any point and access immediately revoked, then what?

I don’t believe OP has said what industry they work in but any employer who allows this sets themselves up for a major cybersecurity failure.

Our IT team would probably have picked this up years ago as we have very tight security and firewalls. Sites like Facebook are blocked anyway.

It sounds like the internet security where the OP works is very lax.

We have to do online internet security training at frequent intervals, and our IT department send spam emails now and again to test us.

I had similar years ago - except that it was a personal email address which wanted to start charging a monthly fee because we had switched broadband provider, not my work email. I did exactly as pp suggested, made a list of everything and just worked through them. I still had access to the inbox for a while which meant I could see stuff come in (but not reply to anything) and action anything I had missed. I also emailed everyone in my address book asking them to use my iCloud address, which I’d had for a while and didn’t use as my main contact until then.

It was a pain and annoying but all okay in the end. I didn’t have the phone side of it though which might complicate it more if you need authentication codes sent and so on, so I would try and get that sorted asap.

Well, she would not be dead! It is merely an administrative inconvenience. Not actually the heights of stupidity that you are claiming. Think of the guy that decided to launch a bottle rocket from his anus. Now that was "incredibly stupid". The OP knows that she has made a mistake, no need to tell her she is the most stupid person on the planet.

Our company allows you to take your number if you want. It's a 5 minute job for an admin. Why would they care about owning a number?

No HR Dept. I ever worked with would tolerate you doing this with your email for one second.

I was once involved (as the "prisoner's friend") at a disciplinary hearing for a guy who had used his work email in this exact same way. I'm not sure how you have got away with this. He got a formal written warning.

[Edited to try and remove quote which is n/a to my comment.]

You know workplaces can see all your emails and activities? Not helpful now i know but there is literally no good reason to do this and is probably a breach of your employment contract. In terms of practicalities i have changed email a few times and it takes a while but it is not too bad. Do the really important ones first and keep a running list. Every time you get a non work email jot down the organisation on your list. You will get there eventually.

Doesn't that all very much depend on the employer and the role? I am thinking of a scenario where the phone is used to deal with external customers or suppliers.

OP takes her phone with her, a customer calls to ask about a product/service and OP says "Sorry, not with ABC Widgets any more but my new employer XYZ Widgets can help". Original company loses sale. Or customer phones the OP who says she's out of the widgets business entirely but she'd be happy to talk to them about her new artisan bakery. Customer is pissed off and now scrabbling around to make a second phone call. I can't see any advantage to the company at all of allowing the OP to take her number with her.

because its potentially their connection to a customer base and the customer base's connection to the company.

thanks heaps to everyone who’s commented really useful stuff. I’ve set up a new email and changed a couple of accounts already.
I’ve no intention of letting work know that I have this issue.
and those who’ve pointed out the obvious that it was dumb… I know!! I can confirm I’m far from the only person who’s done this
i can also confirm I don’t work in an industry that has super sensitive security risks

Because it would extraordinarily unprofessional.

But the disadvantages are also pretty small. It’s definitely done.

go through your spam and make sure you catch all the sites you're registered to, do all the obvious ones that you use a lot, and change your login details.

And in future don't be so daft

@Bleepbleepbleepman does your contract allow you to use your work email and number for personal things???? My DH is not allowed to do this, and neither was I in my previous engineering job.

You can use your phone to find out which passwords you have stored, then you will have to go to each website, login, then change your email and phone number to a personal one.

Or you could ask work very nicely if you could port the phone number, but most companies would not be keen on doing this. And if you're changing the email address anyway you might as well change your number too.

You need to make a list and work through all their websites to change your phone number and email address to personal ones. Start with the most important such as banks and finances, then utilities, broadband, insurance, DVLA/car insurance, NHS, etc., then work down to internet shopping starting with the most used and then onto the lesser used retailers.

Banks and governmental bodies, NHS/GP and then utilities etc are the most important as you'll usually need to get a code pinged to your registered mobile number when you change your email address or try to change phone number, as they tend to ping a code to your current (old) email or phone to check it's you. So you need both old and new emails/phones working at the same time to change things via their websites.

Once you've lost access to your work phone/email, you'll have a much harder job of changing things as you'll need to go through security etc on the phone and banks etc may want to post new login details to your registered home address. (I hope you've not moved as well recently as if you have and not registered your new home address with everyone, then that's going to be even more problematic if you change email and mobile at the same time!!).

It's all going to take time. These things do. And it'll be frustrating. That's why you need to make a list and start with the most important first. It's vital you change details with banks and governmental bodies and NHS/GP. Not so important with online retailers as you can just set up a new account and let the old details be archived. So concentrate on what's important.

Not very professional to use a work email for personal emails though is it ???

I suggest you update the email address on the personal (web) accounts to your personal email account asap, and phone numbers

If you have been using a password manager it will be considerably easier, but there's no automated way to do it.

You might also want to consider owning your own domain name, as it will mean you'll always have control over it, and from my experience seems to be less targeted for scams and spam.

Firstly because it's pointless, the email account will probably be deactivated shortly after the OP leaves.

Secondly - depending on what is in her contract of employment - this is potentially flagging up breach of use.

What I find astonishing is that at no point during the OP's employment with this company did it occur to her that using her employer's email address was inappropriate and a security risk.

The disadvantages are huge for a commercial organisation, as has been pointed out, the last thing you want is a sales enquiry going to a rival firm, or an urgent service request to go to the wrong place. Sending and receiving emails is not a particular problem, just inconvenient to the OP now, and her emails weren't secure, even deleted ones can be retrieved from the email server. I know my work number was diverted to my successor when I retired and then after a few months reallocated, they wanted the sim back but not the phone, but it was 3 years old with a knackered battery.

Possibly not although pre-smart phone it was more common. Nevertheless an out of office would be a very odd thing to do.

I wouldn't have used the work email for so many things like facebook etc. I only used mine once when I had to create a new broadband account, and it wouldn't accept the other one because it was the same, so I used my work email, but changed it as soon as possible. You'll have to just go through the sites and change it I'm afraid.