Adventures in Gender Transition Paperwork….

Steps involved in booking a flight to SoCal and renting a car for the holidays:

  • Southwest won’t let me book flight with frequent flyer program under new name because it doesn’t match old name.
  • Look up Southwest’s frequent flyer name change policy, which requires preparing a written request, plus copies of both old and new photo IDs (and implicitly a copy of the court order), and mailing all that to the home office in Texas.
  • Say fuck it, open a new frequent flyer account — worse case I’ll just have to write off the accumulated mileage from my existing frequent flyer account.*
  • Look at flight reservations. Choose earlier flights than I’d like, because just in case there’s hassles over photo ID,** I don’t want to be booked on the last flight of the evening.
  • Book flight. Omit trusted traveler number (i.e. TSA Pre-Check, because new name won’t match the current number and I don’t know if number will change once I get name updated with TSA).
  • Resign self to dealing with holiday security lines — and the dreaded body scanner*** unless I can get updated Pre-Check info added before flight.
  • Hope that new driver’s license arrives before trip, so that I have photo ID that matches ticket.**
  • Try to book rental car. Hertz won’t let me change name on Hertz Gold account; can’t find info anywhere on how to change it.
  • Say fuck it, decide to open a new Gold account.
  • Resign to losing perks associated with being a long-term Gold member.
  • Start creating new Gold account, realize I need to update AAA info to get AAA discount rate.
  • Can’t find any info online about updating AAA info.
  • Sign into AAA website, go to My Account — YAY! I can change my name online, no questions asked!
  • Change name, request new card from AAA.
  • Back to Hertz, enter AAA number into new Hertz Gold account application.
  • Create new Gold Account.
  • Finally book goddam car.
  • Hope that new driver’s license with photo arrives before trip, so that I have photo ID that matches the reservation.**

* Although I may mail them documentation of name change and ask to if they can transfer my existing mileage to new account.

** I’ve been told that if I don’t have the new driver’s license (I probably won’t have the passport in time for the SoCal trip), I should be able to use the old, invalided driver’s license in combination with the new temporary license (just a slip of paper without a photo) and a copy of the court order showing the legal change of name and gender. Should.

*** Fortunately I never had a problem going through body scanners (before I got TSA Pre-Check), but they’ve been a major source of bureaucratic fuckery by TSA agents who were at best insensitive, at worse actively hostile, to trans people. One big reason I got TSA Pre-Check (OK, actually Global Entry, but GE gives PC privileges) is that you get to go through just an old-school metal detector instead.