Re: Household Phone and Household Email in Tools

When I click on a married woman's name to get to her contact page in "Tools" in my iPhone, I see the following: "Phone", "Email", "Household Phone", "Household Email." Under "Household Phone" and "Household Email" the husband's phone number and email are listed.

When I click on a married man's name to get to his contact page in "Tools" in my iPhone, I see the following "Phone", and "Email" ("Household Phone" and "Household email" are not listed). (What I said is not true for all married men, it seems as though a few married men have specifically added a separate household phone number, but it is true for most married men in my ward).

I have received texts several times from people in my ward trying to reach my wife. These members clicked on my wife's profile in tools, saw my cell phone number listed (under "Household phone") and texted me. I have talked with other members who have also had the same issue. To many people, it is not intuitive or obvious that a woman's "household phone" would reference her "husband's phone." I also find the terminology confusing: a "household" is not the same thing as a husband/ father.

I suggest removing "Household Phone" and "Household Email" from the contact page of a married woman, unless a separate household phone or email address has specifically been added (as is the case for the contact page of a married man). Showing the husband's email / phone on a wife's contact page is not only unnecessary, it also leads to confusion.

I imagine that the original purpose of household phone and household email was a shared phone number (e.g., landline) or shared email. I propose not setting the husband's personal cell phone phone number and email as the default for the household phone number and household email.

The household email and phone fields are not filled in automatically – they are blank by default, and the ward clerk or individual ward member can enter whatever information is wanted in those fields. The fields were more relevant in the past, when not everyone had an email address, and most houses had a land-line that didn't necessarily belong to a single individual in the home. There isn't a rule that says the husband's information needs to be filled into the household email or phone fields.

sbradshaw wrote: Wed Nov 10, 2021 2:52 pm The household email and phone fields are not filled in automatically – they are blank by default, and the ward clerk or individual ward member can enter whatever information is wanted in those fields. The fields were more relevant in the past, when not everyone had an email address, and most houses had a land-line that didn't necessarily belong to a single individual in the home. There isn't a rule that says the husband's information needs to be filled into the household email or phone fields.

Thank you for the quick response. My wife and I did not ever input that information, so perhaps our ward clerk in our first ward post-marriage did. We never realized we could change it. I notice that 8/10 randomly selected married women in the ward have their husband's information listed as their "household" information. I would be surprised if this was all happening because individuals were inputting the husband's contact information as the household contact information. Perhaps it's because clerks are doing all that inputting behind the scenes. I'm not sure, it would be interesting to see exactly goes on in tools when a couple gets sealed and how the household information gets entered.

When I served as clerk, most of the time our members wanted the wife's mobile phone number to be the "household" number (when I asked them). But in absence of any request from the members, the clerk is pretty much left to decide what to do on his own. With many now not having a land line, I see more and more members with no household phone # shown.

sbradshaw wrote: Wed Nov 10, 2021 2:52 pm The household email and phone fields are not filled in automatically – they are blank by default, and the ward clerk or individual ward member can enter whatever information is wanted in those fields. The fields were more relevant in the past, when not everyone had an email address, and most houses had a land-line that didn't necessarily belong to a single individual in the home. There isn't a rule that says the husband's information needs to be filled into the household email or phone fields.

Hi, I think I disagree with your first sentence: I just went to "add household member" for a married couple and the household email and household phone number auto-populated as the male's email and male's phone number. I think that this default should be changed for the reasons detailed in the original post.

pywils wrote: Sun Nov 14, 2021 4:03 pmI think that this default should be changed for the reasons detailed in the original post.

The only effective way for your suggestion to be considered by those who direct the programmer's priorities is to provide feedback from the app or any church web site. You can provide a link to this thread as part of your feedback if you choose. I always recommend that ward and branch clerks stay engaged and "manage" the records rather than be passive about them. It is their responsibility to make sure they are as accurate as possible (with assistance from the ward council).

pywils wrote: Sun Nov 14, 2021 4:03 pm I just went to "add household member" for a married couple and the household email and household phone number auto-populated as the male's email and male's phone number. I think that this default should be changed for the reasons detailed in the original post.

It's not clear what you did. I wouldn't expect the household fields to change just by adding a child.

Please keep in mind that even single members have the "household" fields, even if they are a "household of one". When dealing with a marriage, I'd think the outcome would depend on if you were adding the wife to the husband's household or the other way around.

If you added the husband to the wife's household, and the wife had the household fields fill in but were overwritten by the husband's, then that would be a deliberate programming decision.

Even if it was a deliberate decision, it would be nothing more than affirming the husband as the "head of household".

pywils wrote: Sun Nov 14, 2021 4:03 pm

sbradshaw wrote: Wed Nov 10, 2021 2:52 pm The household email and phone fields are not filled in automatically – they are blank by default, and the ward clerk or individual ward member can enter whatever information is wanted in those fields. The fields were more relevant in the past, when not everyone had an email address, and most houses had a land-line that didn't necessarily belong to a single individual in the home. There isn't a rule that says the husband's information needs to be filled into the household email or phone fields.

Hi, I think I disagree with your first sentence: I just went to "add household member" for a married couple and the household email and household phone number auto-populated as the male's email and male's phone number. I think that this default should be changed for the reasons detailed in the original post.

The household email and phone fields are set for the household. They don't get automatically "copied" to the member record because they don't exist on the member record. In the case where you added a household member for a married couple, I suspect there was already a household phone and email on the household.

I just did a test where I added a member to a household that does not have a household email and phone and the member's profile does not show a household email and phone.

This is working correctly.

pywils wrote: Sun Nov 14, 2021 4:03 pm

sbradshaw wrote: Wed Nov 10, 2021 2:52 pm The household email and phone fields are not filled in automatically – they are blank by default, and the ward clerk or individual ward member can enter whatever information is wanted in those fields. The fields were more relevant in the past, when not everyone had an email address, and most houses had a land-line that didn't necessarily belong to a single individual in the home. There isn't a rule that says the husband's information needs to be filled into the household email or phone fields.

Hi, I think I disagree with your first sentence: I just went to "add household member" for a married couple and the household email and household phone number auto-populated as the male's email and male's phone number. I think that this default should be changed for the reasons detailed in the original post.

I'm not currently a clerk, so I don't currently have access to the tools for managing membership records, but I'm curious if it filled in the household information based on what was filled in under household email and household phone for one of the parents, or if it copied information across from the father's "individual" phone and email field.

If the former, that's what I would expect, because the "household" contact information for one member of the household would normally be the same for all members of the household. If the latter, I could see how that might be a problem in some scenarios.

sbradshaw wrote: Mon Nov 15, 2021 11:53 amI'm not currently a clerk, so I don't currently have access to the tools for managing membership records, but I'm curious if it filled in the household information based on what was filled in under household email and household phone for one of the parents, or if it copied information across from the father's "individual" phone and email field.

The household phone number and email address are on the household, not the person. If they have been set, that applies to all people in the household. That information is not automatically copied from a member record to the household record. If the household phone and email were set by a prior unit, that information will persist when the record is moved to a new unit.

russellhltn wrote: Sun Nov 14, 2021 6:52 pm

pywils wrote: Sun Nov 14, 2021 4:03 pm I just went to "add household member" for a married couple and the household email and household phone number auto-populated as the male's email and male's phone number. I think that this default should be changed for the reasons detailed in the original post.

It's not clear what you did. I wouldn't expect the household fields to change just by adding a child.

Please keep in mind that even single members have the "household" fields, even if they are a "household of one". When dealing with a marriage, I'd think the outcome would depend on if you were adding the wife to the husband's household or the other way around.

...

I apologize that I was not more clear. The man and the woman were listed as separate households (although they had previously been sealed to each other). I went to the husband's page and pressed "add a household member" and added his wife. After that, I went to the wife's page and the household phone and household email were now listed as his phone number and his email address. I didn't pay close enough attention to notice whether it was his individual or his household contact information that was added to his wife's page.

Interesting theory about the outcome depending on whether you start by clicking on the husband's page or the wife's page before clicking "add household member." I will try to test that later.

scgallafent wrote: Mon Nov 15, 2021 12:15 pm The household phone number and email address are on the household, not the person. If they have been set, that applies to all people in the household. That information is not automatically copied from a member record to the household record. If the household phone and email were set by a prior unit, that information will persist when the record is moved to a new unit.

Am I correct in assuming that when merging a married couple into a single household, it depends on who got merged into the other's household?

Where this frequently bites clerks is when they the process a marriage and then wonder why the newlyweds are showing up in the wife's maiden name in the directory. (The directory uses "Household Name" which is a household field, not a membership one).

pywils wrote: Mon Nov 15, 2021 12:20 pm I went to the husband's page and pressed "add a household member" and added his wife. After that, I went to the wife's page and the household phone and household email were now listed as his phone number and his email address.

Again as scgallafent said. That information is stored on the household record. By adding the wife to the husband's household, of course she 'inherits' his household information. Again it is household information, not data copied onto the individual's record.