Im just wondering as I have been sorting out a couple of things recently and feel I would be taken more seriously If the letter or a phone call appeared to be from someone I have employed to do this for me.
For example
Dear Mr Someone
I am writing on behalf of Chew Barker…
…
…
…
Yours sincerely
Pen Name
I don’t see a problem with it. Authors have done it for many many years, i can’t imagine writing a letter be any different.
Suppose it depends who it’s addressed to though, you wouldnt want to send a letter to the IRS with a pen name.
In some circumstances, it would be fraud. For example, if you wrote a character reference for yourself using another name and sent it to a potential employer, that would seem to me to be fraud. If you pretended to be a doctor or a lawyer writing on your behalf, that might break other laws as well as being fraudulent. Of course, IANAL.
Why would you be taken more seriously?
Even if you weren’t doing this for some egregiously fraudulent purpose - as others posters mentioned, things like medical or character references - there could still be problems. Say you were writing one of this pen-name letters as part of a contract negotiation - if the whole thing went litigious later, you might have some 'splainin to do as to why you’d invented a fictitious underling, or even have to prove this person didn’t exist. (For example, if the other side wanted to depose this person).
Don’t do this. The best way to be taken seriously is to simply be serious - be calm, respectful, and have your facts straight. This sort of thing won’t help you, and it could possibly hurt you. It’s a bad idea.
I am not a lawyer, I’m most especially not *your *lawyer, and this is absolutely not legal advice.
I think there’s a big difference. I publish fiction under a pen name, but I always sign correspondence with editors as My Real Name, Writing As Fancy Pen Name. I want the cheques to come payable to me.
To write as a psuedonym ostensibly acting on behalf of my real name smacks of fraud.
Writing the letter with a pen name would be ok so long as the other person is conscious of it and it’s not a legal transaction. Writing as if you weren’t you is definitely not correct and can get you in big doodoo.
My uncle used to have a section in the local newspaper; a couple of times that he wrote letters to the editor they were published under the pen name, but like everybody else he’d had to submit them with his full legal name, contact info and ID#.
The Spanish government doesn’t consider abbreviations of my name to be “an alias,” but in a contract I must use the full form in all its glorious 8 words. Now try to explain to an American that no, a contract for “Maria Lastname” is Not Valid Damnit and anyway my name is not María (the contract was being registered in Spain).
There’s nothing stopping me, as far as I know, from changing my legal name to “Groman Feed and Tractor Supply”. Conversely I don’t see why I couldn’t file a DBA for “Edgar Z. Hummingwhale” and open a bank account in that name - a perfectly legal transaction. While the bank will probably have rules about knowing who I really am, check ID and such, I don’t see why anybody else would have to.
In other words, if you get a letter and a check from Edgar Z. Hummingwhale, my real name doesn’t actually have to be on there anywhere. Corporations and limited liability partnerships are sometimes required by law to indicate themselves as such in correspondence, but sole proprietorships do not as far as I know.
groman is right. There are very few laws in the U.S. regarding names, aliases, and name variations. The rules aren’t eveb unified. You can just start using whatever name you want and it is up to other entities or people whether they want to accept it or not. The feds may want an offical court name change to give you a new social security card but even if you don’t get one, you can still open a bank account under a new name if the bank lets you and start using it right away. It all makes sense really. People go by nicknames all the time and it may become their “real” name. People may also have more than one last name that they freely switch between for different purrposes (e.g. different combinations for a woman after a divorce and remarriage). There isn’t anyone judging what is ok and where the line is drawn. Your name is what you say it is for most purposes.
That isn’t to say there isn’t such a thing as name fraud however. Creating a new name to pose as someone else or commit fraud would be a no-no.
I can give a little more detail, as to why I would like to do this. To help you decided whether it is a bad idea or not to use a pen name.
When I was at uni Pipex supplied my flat with broadband (yeah this is a billing problem, just google “pipex” and “problem” and you will see that this is common) , in september 06 I upgraded our package. Now I have left uni I canceled the service and moved out. Every thing was paid for by direct debit. Now I have noticed that pipex have re-setup my direct debit and have emailed me saying I owe £XXX for the previous service, which is nonsense, I upgrade from package B to package A and the try to charge me for both !
I emailed them and spoke on the phone serval times with my real name and explained the problem, but they are still sending threatening emails and ignoring the facts, (they do not know my current address and I see no reason why they should have as I am no longer a customer).
So I would like to solve this by post or by phone as Mr X working on my behalf, that way they wont find out my current address and phone number. And at the same time appearing like I am not going to back down as it looks like I have called on someone with more experience to handle the problem for me. Is that fraud ? It shouldn’t be, im not saying im a lawyer or anything, just some other name is handleing my business.
In my experience they will simply refuse to deal with X dealing on behalf of Y unless a) You send over power of attorney as proof or b) Both people are on the line at the same time (or sign the document).
Same deal with the UK although the popular belief persists that names have to be ‘legally’ changed.
Pen names are certainly not illegal in the USA. Fraud is though, and so is using a false name to commit fraud.
I once worked at Student Loan Guarantee Agency. A part of the agency was a large group of collections people. Each of them had an assumed name, which they used on all correspondence and in phone calls. This was a common practice, said to be for the safety of the employees – some of the debtors got quite irate and made personal threats against the collections person.
While I was there, a new computer consultant was hired & installed in a desk down the row from me. His name (his real name) happened to be the same as an assumed name that one of the collections people had been using for quite some time. Early in the morning of his first day, he started to get calls routed to him by the operators – people wanting to ‘talk’ (yell & curse) about collections letters he had sent to them. When he denied sending any such letters, and said he didn’t know what they were talking about, they got very incensed and upset with him. After about a half-dozen of these calls, the poor guy was very confused. Took about another day to get that straightened out.
You absolutely cannot do this. You’re passing yourself off as someone else. This is deception and could be construed as an attempt at fraud. And heaven forfend that you intimate or imply that you are a police officer. If the people at the other end have any sense, they’ll want to see a Power of Attorney anyway.
Why are you going to such a palaver anyway? You simply need to speak to your local Citizen’s Advice Bureau or Trading Standards. They will tell you to write to Pipex and tell you what to put in the letter.
Err… You’re probably going to run into the Data Protection Act too.
Unless a third party(the pen name) has the written consent of the Data Subject (you), and is able to prove it to the Data Holder (Pipex), it would be a criminal offence for the Data Holder to provide any information to the third party.
So I would guess (IANAL, but I’ve done data protection act training), that Pipex will simply refuse to deal with the pen name on the grounds that doing so could open them up to prosecution (and the responsible party could actually face gaol).
sorry if I’m being stupid, but why is Pipex the data holder ? what data are they holding ? All they have is my personal details, which I’m sure I’m allowed to pass on as I please and some invoices in my name, both of which is my data, I dont see why Pipex would have to share any other information, a third party already has all they need to make my point for me.
For what its worth, I wont be using a pen name, I just want to know why I cant.
To a large extent it’s because what you are proposing is not accurately described as “using a pen name.” You are inventing a nonexistent person and pretending that communications are coming from him instead of you and implying that he has some degree of authority. That’s fraudulent behaviour.
As a general matter, in the U.S. you can call yourself whatever you want as long as it’s not with a purpose to defraud. If you want to legally change your name, a court must approve it, and usually will unless your proposed new name is obscene or likely to be too confusing to others. A cautionary tale: http://www.cnn.com/2007/LAW/06/23/literary.lawsuit.ap/index.html
I know a private detective who, in the lower left corner of all his correspondence, has his initials followed by “vss,” for the fictional “very sexy secretary” who didn’t type up the letter.
Your personal details are protected data, and it is an offence to pass this information on, even when it appears that a third party is already in possession of that data.
Yes but there could be allegations that you are trying to pass yourself off as one of the Hampshire “Groman Feed and Tractor Supply” who are a very old ,distinguished and wealthy family(the name figures in the Domesday Book and is well known as having had many members in the “Daughters of the American Revolution”)
I dont wish to appear to be a snob but I actually move in those sort of circles .(By the way the rumour is that Combine Harvester ,Groman Feed and Tractor Supply is very likely to become engaged in the near future to Fabricating Welders from the U.S. Steel clan .
I offer them both my best wishes.