Banck from the Bank and I *do* like my husband's style!

[JaneS]

So, DH and I had our appointment with out crappy, sexist bank.

DH agreed I ought to do the talking when we made our complaint as the bank seemed incapable of understanding that women have the power of speech. I told them what had happened and how inappropriate it was: in particular, that they'd suggested I should change my name to DH's and that DH should feel nervous about a joint account, and I should feel happy, because I would 'spend all his money'. And I explained we were angry with DH always being addressed as the main earner, when I earn more than him and they've been told this.

Their response to the comment about me spending all 'DH's' money:

'Well, I'm sure he didn't mean it in a nasty way'. I told them I didn't see how anyone could mean it in a nice way as it was extremely offensive.

When I mentioned being asked to change my name and how rude I thought this was, the (male) banker made the bad mistake of turning to DH and giving him a little grin.

Yeah. DH immediately said, 'we found it very offensive', and they shut right up!

We have canceled the account and we will make formal complaints, but I did tear them off a strip (didn't raise my voice but did get my point across).

On the way out, DH pointed out that this isn't an issue to do with women being awkward (which is what the bank wanted to suggest!); it's simply people who insist that there is only one way of doing things (eg., always talking to the man, always assuming the man earns more). They're not primarily sexist, they're sexist because they are too lazy/ignorant/arrogant to question their automatic assumptions, and this makes it worse because it implies that women's equality isn't even important enough to think about as an issue in its own right.

I was really pleased he said that. I did marry him knowing he wasn't a sexist fuckwit but it was great to see him right there with me and furious when the banker tried to patronize me.

Anyways ... hope you don't mind me clogging up the feminism section with this, it is a bit ranty but I couldn't have done it without people here reminding me it's my right to be furious about this stuff.

Go you two! Go on, tell us which bank it was...

Yay good on you! Even worse that they kept on with it and did the exact same thing you were complaining about.

Yay!

And now, change banks.

Thanks ribena, you are kind. . It was Barclays.

Alice - I know! How crap is that?! You could see him thinking, 'aww, poor man, what a nagging, mouthy wife he has ... I should smile at him and get him on my side ...'. Well that backfired!

Ha great stuff LRD. But, although I see your DH's point, it is primarily sexist because they aren't listening to you. If they were just stuck in their ways and assumed that DH was the main earner, but then apologised and started addressing you after you'd put them right, it would be completely different. They aren't taking you seriously even though it is your earnings that they are talking about. Do follow it up with a letter to head office won't you?

Good for you, and good for your DH :)

The thing was Elephants, it was very interesting watching them working out which of us they should address. DH is Russian, but bilingual. They would address him, diligently, about being the main earner, even though that's me. But, we also found that when DH told them he couldn't produce certain forms of ID on account of being Russian, they started talking to me, over his head, about what ID he might have.

I think they were incredibly sexist, don't get me wrong. But it is depressing that this sexism went hand-in-hand with other kinds of discrimination, because they were assuming that all sorts of groups of people (women, minorities, etc.) were 'lesser' than the norm: white, able-bodied British males.

(I say this because I've had issues with Barclays and my very minor disabilities, too).

I will write a letter to head office - might ask for some help with it on here if that's ok.

Ask away

Thanks, will do! I just need to wait a bit to simmer down and get my mind around it - I hate writing letters!

I Knew it was Barclays.

I had a woman in the call centre once tell me I HAD to change to Mrs, even if I kept my own name (which I have) as I am married. And then helpfully saying, "I'll just do that for you now shall I".

Ditto, they wouldn't give us the discount on the account because they forgot to look at MY salary when working out if we were eligible. Needless to say, I was very unimpressed.

Good on you both :)

And silly Barclays upsetting an MNer - I am about to open a business bank account and I shall cross them off the list of possible banks

Yes, that sounds predictable and depressing, Bling.

Lady - I'm really unimpressed by them, but I suspect customer service is really just to do with the area you live in and the actual people in the branch. I've had good experiences with Barclays before but around here, they're clearly untrained twats.

It didn't help that they kept going on about how I should be happy to bank with them because they were so good at building a 'personal' relationship with clients and how if I went elsewhere, I'd have no built-up overdraft to spend.

If they'd looked at my account just briefly (and it was right on the screen in from of him this time), they'd have seen I never dip into my overdraft so it was a stupid thing to say.

I just knew it was Barclays!

Well done LittleRedDragon and husband!

Excellent result! I'm glad you both worked in partnership to make your feelings on the matter heard. It's a small step but each of those steps brings gender equality closer.

Men who behave in a sexist way do themselves no favours - and quite frankly sound like boring farts.

Go MN Mafia LadyBiscuit!

Bloody barclays, so many sexist tossers in one place can't be a coincidence - maybe they test for it in the interview.

Celtic - I agree!

Good result today, anyway - we went in to transfer the accounts to HSBC and the man there really brought home to me how horrible Barclays were, because he was so nice! We told him we'd just got married and he looked at the names we'd got on our ID documents and just said, 'right, is that Mrs LRD or Ms? No name-changing? Sorry, I'm only asking because you've just got married and some people do change their names'.

Awesome.