AIBU about changing my title with my bank?

[gallicgirl]

My work colleagues seem to think I am and I'm willing to admit that I might be over-dramatising a bit but it's peeing me off.

I got married a few weeks back and I've kept my name. I've not bothered to notify any institutions other than changing my title at work from Miss to Mrs, mostly because being called Miss annoyed me a bit.
Anyway, I noticed my debit card on our joint account expires shortly so I phoned up to ask if I can have my title changed from Miss to Mrs on the card. I don't recall asking for Miss, DH filled in the application, I suspect he asked me what I preferred and I probably shrugged and said I didn't care.

So I pass security questions on phone banking only to be told a change of title constitutes a change of name and I need to fill in a form. I gently remonstrate with the chap on the phone but don't make a big fuss because I create enough bureaucracy at work and he's just doing his job. It turns out not only do I have to sign a form but I also have to provide proof of said name change. Seems bloody ridiculous to have to provide an original marriage certificate to change my title when I am entitled to use whatever the hell title I like.
I feel like telling them I want no title and see what kind of proof they require of that! Is it me or does this seem ridiculous?
Men get a default MR but women have to jump through hoops to justify how they want to be identified.

If a client was to say it yes, in practice people rarely do.

I've just realised that my bank ac has Dr and I don't think I ever specifically asked for it ( and certainly didn't have to give them proof) - I think they may just have picked it up in correspondence after I used it on a (justifiably) pissy letter. It was a branch next to a uni so presumably commonplace for them.

My bank still has me as Miss, I'll drop them a note and see if they'll update it as it has been annoying me for ages, but after the DP added and automatically put first on bank statements debacle I suppose I didn't want to be the 'and one more thing' person.

I imagine I can find something with Ms. on it - another bank statement from somewhere else perhaps (with the implied threat that I'll take my business elsewhere)

FYI, I kept using Miss with the bank because I use the path of least resistance.

I asked about it when I got my PhD many many moons ago. I needed to take my graduation certification to the bank to change my title to Dr. However, for any new applications, for example, a new credit card, they just accepted I'm a Dr, no question asked. It's ridiculous.

And now I'm in my 40s, I'm automatically a Mrs Myname. It seems if you are old enough, you'll be a Mrs even if they don't know if you are married. (Or many cases they haven't even seen me with my children which they could infer I'm married however wrong that is, because 1/2 of UK children are born outside of marriage).

Politeness says that you use the title the client uses, surely?

No, I prefer first name basis. I hate titles.

I don't understand why anyone wants to put Dr on their ID? I am a medical doctor too, all my male friends have it, none of my female and anyone with a PhD I know has it. Why? Who needs to know that?

Only if they insist on titles. I prefer just my name. But some very dated organisations insist. I am never a Mrs because I refuse to be defined by my marriage status. I can use Miss because it's my title from birth. Same with Ms. But if they must insist, I'm Dr Myname. Maybe it's not common in medical circles to use titles. But academics always do.

I prefer no titles, too, but I think I'd a client has said, "I prefer to be called Mrs Bloggs, " it would be very rude to call her Frederick, eben if that's your preference - it's clearly not hers.

Frederica, that said.

Apart from Dr, Prof, etc, what purpose do titles serve anyway? I can't see any. I would much rather be addressed by my first name.

And if we have to have titles, we need to have one title for women, just like men have. Men don't have put up with the male equivalent of 'is it Miss, Mrs or Ms' every time they fill a form in or give their details.

I would prefer the adult woman title to be Ms, but Mrs would also be acceptable as long as it is just taken as an 'adult woman' title instead of the current usage which is mostly 'adult married woman'.

I had trouble with this at the job centre once. I'm a medical doctor, but was between jobs waiting for Visas to work overseas a while.

Options on the system were Mrs, Ms, or miss. For women that is. The drop down for men included lt commander, reverend, brigadier and prof as well as Dr. I only needed my stamp paid, as had savings, so refused to sign the form until they could get my name right. It took eight weeks, but they sent me a form to countersign. I eventually signed on, four weeks after signing off and on the other side of the world!

I filled in an online form with Mx recently, because it was (unusually) an option. A while later, I had a call from the organisation, and quite clearly the man at the other end of the line had never heard of Mx. However, unlike the form, he was able to set it so I have no title at all, which is even better.

But I do think, if they're programming in these options on to forms (and they should), then they need to make sure their staff have some awareness.

Oo lots of responses. It seems I'm not alone with this.

Yes, staff do need to be aware and polite. I think at work we tend to default to Ms unless the client specifies other and it is possible to do no title. We also wouldn't insist on a form or certificate to make a change but equally, few people volunteer fraudulently to pay a large bill so the title really isn't an issue.

EBearhug I have something similar, but with ethnicity and the NHS. When you register a child originally, you can put 'not declaring' (or something similar) for ethnicity. But when I take my DD to the hospital, and used the self check in, it complained her details aren't complete and I must select an ethnicity!

The awareness also needs to be extended to systems using the same data.

Knottyknitter I can't believe it! How sexist is that system. Whoever designed it needs to be slapped.

As regards using Dr, the marvelous (enlightening) advantage of using the ole doctorate is that it is one of the few titles where it doesn't reveal your sex. Once I was left standing on a street corner waiting for a lift from a rental agent, who later admitted that I didn't look like a Dr. When booking into hotels, the missus finds it amusing to book us in as Dr & Mrs, and wait and see if anyone acts surprised (she isn't Mrs BTW, since we didn't change/swap/amalgamate names or titles upon marriage).

I never had to send the bank anything. but that was quite a few years ago.

"I use mr on those drop down menu's when dr isnt available but you must put a title (as miss or mrs arent my title either)"

Ditto to this!

I'm all in favour of women using the title Dr, for the reasons above, plus as an acknowledgement of the fact that it really hasn't been that long that women were allowed to obtain degrees (and Cambridge after all didn't award bachelors degrees to women until 1947.) AT ALL. A maths teacher at my old girls school, we discovered she has a PhD but didn't use the title, and we all felt this was slightly wrong! Why should her irrelevant marital status be flagged, but not her totally relevant academic status! So I guess I made my decision on that one before I left school.

No, I prefer first name basis. I hate titles.

Precisely. The title the client prefers includes none.

advantage of using the ole doctorate is that it is one of the few titles where it doesn't reveal your sex

Actually, there are plenty that don't. Dr. Prof. Revd. All of the military ranks. The main ones that are gendered are Mrs/Miss/Ms vs Mr/Mstr, plus the hereditary and honorary titles.

There's all sorts of inequality in honorary titles, of course. For example, the wife of a Sir is Lady, but the husband of a Dame is Mr. And for same-sex couples, does anyone know what the title is for the husband of a Sir or the wife of a Dame? I think Elton John's husband is Mr, isn't he?

I don't think YABU. That said...why change your title to Mrs if you're keeping your surname?

Seems like an odd contradiction?

I am unmarried and choose Ms and when I get married will most likely stay Ms as its no-one's business what my marital status is.

...and Wikipedia tells me...

Mrs originated as a contraction of the honorific Mistresss, the feminine of Misterr, or Masterr, which was originally applied to both married and unmarried women. The split into Mrs for married women and Misss for unmarried began during the 17th century;[1][2] the 20th century saw the coinage of a new unmarked option Mss^.

^^Ignore that, I carried on reading the thread and saw someone had already answered

"Actually, there are plenty that don't. Dr. Prof. Revd. All of the military ranks. The main ones that are gendered are Mrs/Miss/Ms vs Mr/Mstr, plus the hereditary and honorary titles. "

Well, I wouldn't say it was plenty in terms of holders, I think most of us are more likely to meet a Dr (and I regard Prof as related to Dr since both academic) than a Revd, or some Lord or Lady (at least in my neck of the woods!).

And what do you call a collection of Reverends --- apart from a synod of course, and us non-revs are the 'flock' so it can't be that............

I think most of us are more likely to meet a Dr (and I regard Prof as related to Dr since both academic) than a Revd

I suspect that whether you are more likely to meet someone with a PhD than someone entitled to called themselves Reverend is a class indicator: for the university educated middle classes it's probably true (if you don't have a PhD yourself, probably at least one of your contemporaries does), but I suspect for a lot of people they are much more likely to meet a vicar than someone with a PhD. There's probably a PhD in that .

"......but I suspect for a lot of people they are much more likely to meet a vicar than someone with a PhD. "
O god, now I'm going to have to compute the relative probabilities!

Or use the relationship between the incidence of vicars and the social class membership (linked, I suspect, via house prices) as an example of Bayes Theorem in next years conditional probability slide....................

And just wondering why I've never met a vicar in uniform on a train. Do they all travel first class, or just incognito? Do they have a special 'vicars van' that you have to book (the way you now have to book a bike place)? Or are there just no vicars left................................

(On reflection, perhaps a clerics carriage, with standard class seats for vicars, first class for bishops, and any arch-bishops get to requisition a steam engine and drive!) .

I think the heat has addled my brain.........................

Haha nowadays vicars don't really wear uniform outside of work requirements. You might get a dog collar but the ones I've known are very relaxed.

I'm not sure why this narks me so much. Someone upthread asked why use Mrs with my surname. Does that sound odd?

I like being married and don't mind people knowing if it's on my terms and of my choosing. However I don't feel the need to shout about it. As for keeping my name, I like it, there aren't many others and it's a faff to change it. It's my identity too.... Something that feels particularly important after having children as you do get identified solely as mother of x child.
I know it's not common but I've had a few comments about it.