This may be old news to some, but it was new news to me. I had a customer service person tell me that someone had an email address very similar to mine, only theirs was all caps and that I should take my complaint to Gmail and ask them why they allow this. (Someone was using my email address and I was getting their “order receipts”, so I had asked the company to please put an end to this). After shaking my head for a bit, I decided I’d better reply to that customer service person with a link from Gmail explaining that case doesn’t affect an email address, [email protected] is the same as [email protected].
In looking for a link to send, I came across another great tidbit of info from Gmail. Not only does case not matter, but dots don’t either. I do use a dot between my first and last name in my gmail address, that’s how I signed up. Little did I know I can easily drop that dot or add more anywhere between any letters and still get my email!
Sometimes you may receive a message sent to an address that looks like yours but has a different number or arrangement of periods. While we know it might be unnerving if you think someone else’s mail is being routed to your account, don’t worry: both of these addresses are yours.
Gmail doesn’t recognize dots as characters within usernames, you can add or remove the dots from a Gmail address without changing the actual destination address; they’ll all go to your inbox, and only yours. In short:
- [email protected] = [email protected]
- [email protected] = [email protected]
- [email protected] = [email protected]
All these addresses belong to the same person. You can see this if you try to sign in with your username, but adding or removing a dot from it. You’ll still go to your account.
If you get mail that seems to be intended for someone else, it’s likely that the sender entered the wrong address, just like if you’ve ever dialed a wrong phone number for someone. In these cases, we suggest contacting the original sender or website when possible to alert them to the mistake.
One last thing: Google Apps does recognize dots. If you’d like to have a dot in your username, please ask your domain administrator to add your preferred username as a nickname.
So basically, [email protected] is the same as [email protected] and [email protected]
I learn something new everyday.
