Many individuals of transgender and non-binary experience will no longer be “deadnamed” by the plastic in their wallets: Mastercard is rolling out a “True Name” program in which cardholders can replace their debit, credit, and prepaid cards with ones bearing the name they actually use, and a legal name change isn’t even required.
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Experts told The Washington Post the program is a first for the financial services industry, and it solves a problem faced by many cardholders. In a 2015 National Center for Transgender Equality survey, 32 percent of trans and non-binary respondents “who have shown an ID with a name or gender that did not match their gender presentation were verbally harassed, denied benefits or service, asked to leave, or assaulted.”
The company’s goal is to have the True Name program in place with its issuing banks by 2020. “We are allies of the LGBTQIA+ community, which means if we see a need or if this community is not being served in the most inclusive way, we want to be a force for change to help address and alleviate unnecessary pain points,” Randall Tucker, Chief Diversity and Inclusion Officer for Mastercard, said in a press release. “This translates not only for our Mastercard employee community but for our cardholders and the communities in which we operate more broadly. Our vision is that every card should be for everyone.”
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“I didn’t have to convince anyone to the necessity of this,” Scott Turner Schofield, a performer with GLAAD’s Transgender Media Program who was involved in True Name discussions, told the Post. “They were completely on board and recognized this as a barrier of access to people, as unfair, and they just fixed it. That’s the kind of corporate leadership we really want to see.”
Brian
I don’t have a problem with this, but what happens when they try to use the card and someone asks for ID to verify the name? It doesn’t happen all that frequently, but it definitely does happen.
truthseeker
@Brian
I posted a similar comment but it was deleted. This could lead to lots of identity fraud and trouble for businesses.
If the business looks at the trans person’s ID and the name nor the photo match, they’ll decline the purchase and the trans person will start a Twitter boycott of the business.
Plus there’s the issue of identity theft or claims of it. What if a trans person stops paying their credit card bill and a bill collector comes after them but they claim the name of the person they are seeking isn’t a legal name.
It’s just “woke capitalism” of businesses trying to lure in customers (some of whom are the same ones who protest against capitalism). Most importantly, people can already LEGALLY change their name. Why not just do that and open accounts in your new legal name?
Heywood Jablowme
This doesn’t seem like it would be a “new” thing since after all, heterosexual women have been changing their last names to married names, forever. Isn’t it something that financial institutions are used to?
truthseeker
@Heywood Jablowme
That’s an instance where someone’s name has legally changed. This is different. Master Card is letting them put down whatever they feel like being called.
Why don’t they just legally change their name?
Matt in SD
@truthseeker
They answered most of that in the linked article, including the lengthiness and expense of the legal name change process. This, as described, is a sort of stop gap solution for those still saving for or going thru a legal name change. The name on the card is linked to all their legal information so yes, they do know who the person is as much as they do anyone else. It also says the banking experts figuring out the nuts and bolts of this don’t anticipate any more risk of identity theft from this than usual. Sounds like they’re covering all their bases, and I think it’s a great thing!