SURNAME CHANGE

[steiner0400]

Good day all.

Ill get right to the point.


How many leaps and bounds does one (a recruit) have to traverse to change their surname after being admitted into the forces?

 

[392]

No more than any CF member who has gotten married and changed their surname to that of their spouse...

 

[Occam]

Yes, and do it long before you ever get a DWAN (administrative web & e-mail) account.  You can thank me later.  ;D

 

[Tibbson]

Good day all.

Ill get right to the point.


How many leaps and bounds does one (a recruit) have to traverse to change their surname after being admitted into the forces?

Essentially, none.  You have a surname on your birth certificate, you have your new one on other documents (and if you were adopted at a later date, your new birth certificate) and you enroll like everyone else.  Even with a name change you are still linked, behind the scenes, to the original name so it wont cause any problems.  My adopted kids even have new SIN cards but I. The system they are still linked to their old numbers for archives purposes.

 

[blackberet17]

My gf recently went back to her maiden name. No "real" issues, but it took time, approx. 5-6 mos for her name change to be effective in the CF.

And Occam, funny you should mention, there were DWAN issues

 

[Occam]

"Hello, Help Desk?  Where did all my email and my Q drive go??"  ;D

 

[Old EO Tech]

"Hello, Help Desk?  Where did all my email and my Q drive go??"  ;D

I rarely use my Q drive for anything, and PST files are wonderful inventions to save emails

 

[Occam]

<tangent>

Where do you put your PST files?  On your local hard drive?  You know hard drives fail, right? 

I have gigabytes of data on my Q drive, most of which gets used on a daily basis - including e-mail archives from my predecessors all the way back to 2000 - and I access them frequently.

</tangent>

 

[Old EO Tech]

<tangent>

Where do you put your PST files?  On your local hard drive?  You know hard drives fail, right? 

I have gigabytes of data on my Q drive, most of which gets used on a daily basis - including e-mail archives from my predecessors all the way back to 2000 - and I access them frequently.

</tangent>

I put them on my C drive in a folder, and have a backup on a USB stick.  With Win7/Exchange you are not even supposed to have the pst files on a network drive, Win7/outlook 2013 doesn't support it.  And you risk corrupting all that important data you have.  Even the other files you have on your Q drive should be backed up on your C drive once a week, chances of a hard drive failing is a lot less than the network screwing up :-/  If you can always ask your local IT section to get you an external hard drive, if you have a lot of data that you want multiple backups for.

 

[Occam]

My working version of my PST files (as well as my predecessor's archive files) are on my local hard drive, but I back up to the Q drive once a week.  The archive files never change so they don't need to be part of the backup.  Outlook 2010 will support networked PST files, it's just painfully slow and you risk corruption if they go over 1 GB in size.  I agree they're much more easily and quickly accessed locally - but I still have the backup to the Q on the network.

Network storage is not only set up in a RAID configuration in the event of a server hard drive going bad, but it's also backed up to tape for those times you hit the delete button and didn't really mean to.  I'd trust the network 10x more than I'd trust a single external hard drive or USB stick.  YMMV. 

 

[steiner0400]

Totally off topic fellas. ^

 

[Occam]

Totally off topic fellas. ^

It'll be good info for if and when you're recruited, and you get a DWAN account.

 

[blackberet17]

"Hello, Help Desk?  Where did all my email and my Q drive go??"  ;D

Actually, she couldn't access her e-mail, period. Profile issues. She was told she needed to provide the addresses of all the computers she's ever logged into, so they could delete her old profile from those computers, so it would recognize the new profile, with the surname change.

Which would have been fun...postings from one end of Canada to the next, courses in Kingston, Gagetown, and now PRes, with a couple Cl Bs in Kingston and Gage...rough estimate of about 30 computers different computers, not including laptops...

 

[Fishbone Jones]

It'll be good info for if and when you're recruited, and you get a DWAN account.

He's still right though.

 

[AKa]

That's interesting.  I reverted to my maiden name last fall and the process was relatively painless.  At least as far as military was concerned...

I think it is important to engage with your IT support desk in advance of your name change.  My personal drive was re-named without difficulty and for three months, any emails sent to AK.oldname@forces.gc.ca were automatically forwarded to my proper account. My only difficulty was with my PKI card, which should not be an issue for a new recuit.

A little bit of forward planning pays dividends when you're changing something as fundamental as your surname.  Of course, in retrospect, I wish I had not changed my name when I married.  But that's another topic.

Cheers,

AK

 

[steiner0400]

That's interesting.  I reverted to my maiden name last fall and the process was relatively painless.  At least as far as military was concerned...

I think it is important to engage with your IT support desk in advance of your name change.  My personal drive was re-named without difficulty and for three months, any emails sent to AK.oldname@forces.gc.ca were automatically forwarded to my proper account. My only difficulty was with my PKI card, which should not be an issue for a new recuit.

A little bit of forward planning pays dividends when you're changing something as fundamental as your surname.  Of course, in retrospect, I wish I had not changed my name when I married.  But that's another topic.

Cheers,

AK

Thanks for the insight, ill do the research now on everything a civi needs to do for their documentation.

Wish my mother had just given me my fathers last name instead of her ex's (my brothers father).

Oh well..

 

[AKa]

For changing your name, the key early contacts are your orderly room and the IT folks (if you have a DWAN account).  The orderly room will have a distribution list that they use for name changes, informing all the key CAF agencies. 

As I expect that you are talking about a legal name change (which is different than a woman assuming or relinquishing her husband's name) , you may require certification that the legal change has taken place before your paperwork in the military can begin.

And when you are changing everything in your civilian life, don't forget about your loyalty programs.  Aeroplan and Via Preference,  in particular, are a pain to update but the name difference can complicate bookings and getting credit for your travel.

Good luck,

AK

 

[steiner0400]

For changing your name, the key early contacts are your orderly room and the IT folks (if you have a DWAN account).  The orderly room will have a distribution list that they use for name changes, informing all the key CAF agencies. 

As I expect that you are talking about a legal name change (which is different than a woman assuming or relinquishing her husband's name) , you may require certification that the legal change has taken place before your paperwork in the military can begin.

And when you are changing everything in your civilian life, don't forget about your loyalty programs.  Aeroplan and Via Preference,  in particular, are a pain to update but the name difference can complicate bookings and getting credit for your travel.

Good luck,

AK

I knew there was a reason I never signed up for air miles...

Thanks for the help.

 

[Sparkplugs]

So in the last three years, I've done both a change to married name, and then recently, a formal and legal name change. The married name was a way bigger pain in the arse. If your OR staff are on point, it's relatively painless. However, between two of my ORs, somehow I ended up with two security profiles, which is a horror show of admin. Beyond that, everything went awesome.

If at all possible, get your name change done before you get your offer. It's way easier to tell recruiting that your name changed, than to do a huge admin dealie later on. WAY less hassle later.

Shoot me a PM if you need any info -- I did mine in Ontario, and I was born here, so the actual formal name change was easy.