Yup… Been There

How many times I have been “sired” it is irritating but does cause problems when you call your bank, credit card company, or for healthcare.

Transgender woman cannot make bank transactions because she ‘sounds like a man’ 
Metro UK
By James Hockaday
August 1, 2019

A transgender woman cannot make phone transactions with her bank because they said she ‘sounds like a man’.

Ellen Westerleigh, 22, was also sent a new bank card with ‘Mr’, instead of ‘Miss’, despite telling HSBC she now identifies as a woman.

She was unable to withdraw money from her account because the operator thought she was a different person, despite passing security questions beforehand.

Miss Westerleigh has been told she will have to travel to her nearest branch, in central Nottingham, to make transactions.

She told the Nottingham Post: ‘Every time I ring up to speak about my account they say I “don’t sound like a woman.” I have to prove who I am and I shouldn’t be having to do that.

Yup. Been there had that happen; I had a fraudulent charge on my credit card so I called them up to report it… immediately I was transferred to security. Since this wasn’t the first time I was transferred to  security I knew what to do… have them look up date that I changed my name.

Another time a nurse would give me the results of lab test… “I sorry sir I can only give the results to Diana!” after arguing with her I hung up and got another nurse who knew me.

HSBC says it is reviewing Miss Westerleigh’s complaint and have introduced recent changes to their system and training to support transgender customers.

A spokesman for the bank said: ‘We are very sorry for the disappointing level of service experienced by Miss Westerleigh, and are committed to learning from this to help ensure it doesn’t happen again.

One of the thing they can do is annotate our records with something like “has a deep voice.” Not a good solution but maybe it will stop being misgendered.

Has this happened to you? Tell us about it.