Hi.
If you’re reading this page it’s probably because you followed a link I sent after I got your misdirected email.
Wow – you wrote a page just for me?
Well, no, not really. I get a lot of misdirected emails. I mean a LOT. I went through a phase of trying to reply to everybody telling them about the mistake, but I’m afraid I got a little bit fed up of the usual responses. Things like:
- “No, this is the right address, I suggest you change yours”, and
- “Well I think you should tell Google”, and
- “No really, are you coming to our fundraiser / party / meeting / job interview or not?”
So I thought I’d condense all my replies into one handy webpage and send everyone here. I am not trying to be a smartass; I am just trying to help.
But I sent my email to the right address…
No you didn’t.
Yes I did.
No, you really didn’t. Sorry. You sent your email to myfirstname.mylastname@gmail.com. That email address is mine and unless Google change their rules, it always will be.
Ahh – no I didn’t! I sent my email to ‘yourfirstnameyourlastname@gmail.com’ – no dot, see?! Ha!
Hmm – that’s quite a common one actually. Google ignores those dots – they just don’t care. It was a decision they made to stop people registering confusingly similar email addresses, but what it means is that emails to any of the following addresses end up with me:
- firstname.lastname@gmail.com
- firstnamelastname@gmail.com
- firstnam.e.lastname@gmail.com
- f.i.r.s.t.n.a.m.e.l.a.s.t.n.a.m.e@gmail.com
- f..............................irstnamelastname@gmail.com
You get the idea.
But this is the email address I was given.
Yeah, that happens too. If your Matt told you his address verbally then it’s possible he didn’t spell it out and his address is subtly different. It might have a middle initial, or just the one ‘t’, or some other variation that makes his address different from mine. I can’t really guess what that is, I’m afraid, so if you really want your mail to get through you’ll need to get back in touch with him some other way and confirm the right address. You can go into that conversation armed with the info above, so if they try to insist their address is some variant of “myfirstname.mylastname@gmail.com” then you can explain why they’re wrong 🙂
Can’t you just forward my email on?
Erm, no, sorry. There’s no way for me to know which of the seemingly quite numerous Matts you were trying to email, and I really don’t want to get into the business of trying to figure it out. I get enough email that’s actually meant for me…
Do people really get cross with you?
Yep. Depressingly frequently. The quotes above are all real actual quotes from real actual people I’ve spoken to after receiving an email about a carpet delivery, or a haircut, or a school disco, or something else that has nothing to do with me. Understandably the average person trusts people they know far more than some random bloke on the internet who claims to share a name with the person that they actually know, so I get it.
I just can’t do anything about it.
OK. Well, erm, thanks. I guess.
You’re welcome. I’m genuinely sorry I can’t be more help.