Posted by
My cat and I just moved in with my boyfriend. Aside from the one time I moved from one apartment to another in the same building, this has been the easiest move ever. It’s basically within the same zip code. (I don’t get around much.) But by far the biggest annoyance about the move is changing my address.
There are so many places that I keep realizing that I need to tell about my address change. Some of them made the move feel ultra-official, and some of them seem pointless until they really bite you in the ass later…
- Obviously the bank and credit cards.
- Amazon and/or your favorite shopping website — The first time I had something Primed to me, and it never showed up… yeah, oops. I quickly made it Amazon-official after that.
- Waze — If you’re a Los Angeleno, you live and die by the Waze app. And the moment I changed my official home address on that little app, I felt a moment of happy chills.
- Car insurance policy — That one’s a pain in the ass, because then they want to call and chat about it and possibly change your plan. Ugh.
- That one savings account that you forgot about — You obviously got your bank account switched over, because you want your billing and your shipping address to be the same when you’re internet shopping, but don’t forget about those other non-primary bank accounts.
- Your work — I’m not sure how long I let my paycheck continue to be sent to my apartment after I moved out, probably too long.
- USPS mail forwarder, which is a thing I didn’t know existed until Ariel told me about it.
Help! What other places am I forgetting to update my new address?
DMV/RMV
This isn’t changing your address, but make sure to register to vote at your new address!
I found that I missed one or two address changes by way of a notice from those companies that they received an update of my address from USPS so definitely make sure to change your address with USPS.
On the plus side, if you do forget to change your address for your voter registration and live in the same general area, you can still vote- you just have to go a bit farther!
Not if you live in a vote-by-mail state, like Oregon! 🙂
If you live in Canada and forget to update your address for an election (or are just on vacation or something), you can still vote anywhere theres a polling station – even if its a completely different province than your assigned station in a federal election. It will, however, be a bit of a hassle for everyone involved as the poll workers will have to take down all of your information to confirm your eligibility to vote, and then your vote has to get sent to the right station and be confirmed to not be a double and added to the count so your vote wont be immediately added. So just update your information once an elections been called to avoid all that, or if you’re away from home, signing up to vote by mail can often even be done entirely online.
Your cell phone bill, if you still get paper statements. Definitely don’t want the next rando looking at who you called.
I finally made a master list after having six addresses in about 7 years (not all may apply):
Identity:
drivers license/ID
voter registration
USPS change of address form
Work:
HR/Payroll
Health insurance
Resume
Money:
banks
credit cards
investments
retirement account(s) from old jobs, etc.
Utilities:
Cell phone
Landline
Internet provider
Cable company
Electricity
Water
Gas/heat company
Online:
PayPal, Amazon, ebay, whatever your regular stops are
Transit:
car registration
car insurance
auto club
bicycle registration
transit passes
Social:
Family
Friends
College alumni offices
Other clubs and organizations that mail you things
Magazine subscriptions
Oh this is awesome. I totally forgot about Paypal and eBay!
Yes! I don’t know how many times I lost online orders because it would revert the shipping address to an old paypal address instead of the one I’d entered with the site. Or vice versa depending on the move.
This is so helpful, Sue! Saving for future reference. Thank you!
I’m adding some ideas I’ve remembered and that others mentioned:
Doctors’ offices
Gym-update/cancel membership
Charities
Library card
Pet registration/vet/chip
Student loans!
Renter’s/homeowner’s insurance.
Can you tell I’ve moved again? I keep finding things that didn’t make the list. 🙂
Animal Control. Completely forgot about this one because, frankly, who thinks about it? But my renewal for my dogs’ licences didn’t show up at my new address, completely forgot about it and ended up having to pay more because I didn’t renew in time.
I’d add the microchip address to this pet related list.
Yes! This is so important. When we went to the shelter to get a new cat, they had a thirteen year old cat there whose microchip has two out of date phone numbers as the only contact information, so even though they tried to contact the owner, they couldn’t. Maybe that’s on purpose, but in any case, you don’t want that to happen by accident.
My big list from my last move (and in preparation for my next one), in rough order of priority:
– Bank
– credit card
– Electricity
– Telephone
– Water
– Internet
– TV License
– insurance
– My employer
– OH employer (not so relevant to you, but if you’re down as an emergency contact worth making sure no one is phoning your old flat!)
– Publishers
– HMRC
– student loan
– Council Tax
– Voter registration
– Doctors
– Dentist
– Driving licenses
– library
– Amazon
– Paypal
– Etsy
– ebay
– LibraryThing
– wine club
– online food shopping (never use, so now refer to some very old addresses!)
– various loyalty cards
– magazine subscription (good chance to cancel and then resubscribe for a cheaper ‘new customer’ offer!)
– people!
Why is the wine club so far down on that list!? That would be hovering right around #2 for me. 😉
If you order delivery online, make sure you change that address, too! Last thing you want is your move-in day pizza going to your old place.
AHHH!!! You motherfuckinggenius,you!
Also in Canada, you update it with the Canada Revenue Agency and on your Health card
Your online food delivery app! Also, I know that I’m one of like 7 twenty-somethings who still subscribes to magazines, but make sure you update those too.
Fun times… I change it with all the places I can think of and the post office. Then, when I get a forwarded letter from the old address with the yellow sticker from the post office, I make sure to call that place and change the address with them, too. There is always somewhere that you forget, or somewhere that you tell 3 times and they still send it to the wrong place. Also, if you friends or family like to send you mail or presents, make sure to tell them the new address, too. I used to send a mass email to people who send me regular mail saying that I moved and the new address and current/same cell phone #… But, I’m not sure if people still do this.
If you have to license pets where you live, contact the licensing bureau to update your address where you live. Also update your vet on your new address!
Opticians and DVLA for your car registration docs (V5 log book? The blue and red and yellow document) you need that updated for vehicle tax and (hopefully not) any speeding fines or similar.
Other than that, MinaKelly’s got all the UK ones that I can think of. Also, yes, you do need to do HMRC separately. My workplace pension was updated via HR but HMRC want you to tell them separately
If you do any charitable giving, don’t forget to let your favorite nonprofits know!
Also, I usually announce my new address to my family and friends via closed Facebook message. That way, I still get any christmas cards and wedding invites they are trying to send to me. I missed a RSVP date for a wedding because I forgot to tell the bride my address had changed. She was super gracious about it though and I was still able to attend!
“Charitable giving.” This. Easy to forget about because I often only get a few pieces of mail from them per year and that post office forward service is only for a few months. But in January when I start looking for all my tax documents…..
Places I have forgotten to change my address and lived to regret my life decisions:
– Ikea catalogue (Like, what even is living without it?)
– Same for Uncommon Goods, Think Geek and American Science & Surplus
– Maker’s Mark Ambassador Program
– Subscription boxes
Super timely! My huge house is finally breaking up after 4 years, so we’re moving in a few weeks. The post office thing is my first move. As I’m doing my taxes I’ll generate a list of financial places too. And register to vote. After that I like another lady face’s strategy of paying attention to which mail has the forwarding sticker and doing that. I’ll need to be careful with the online places that I don’t just blindly check out with the same address! Luckily Amazon lets you change orders after they’re placed.
Change/disable all your one click checkout accounts to prevent accidents! The post office in the UK so a mail forwarding service, I’m hoping that catches anything I miss next week
This is a very timely post! Mr SB and I are house hunting and may move this summer, depending on how things go. So I’ll be bookmarking this for future reference since there’s tons of good suggestions in this post! 🙂
We’re in the same boat. Hoping to be in a home of our own before next winter. I was pretty good about changing my address when I moved out of my parent’s house and in with my now husband. He was not. We lived together for nearly three years before he changed his address on ANYTHING! So, I know I’ll be taking the lead on this when we do finally find a house =P
As an aside, consider getting a post office box. It’s not for everyone but if you anticipate moving around or if you’re concerned about your physical address being out there for safety reasons it could be a good option – if you’re okay remembering to go check it.
A girl I knew got a PO box her freshman year of college, and that was a fricking GENIUS move. Where the rest of us were having to update addresses each year when we changed apartments, she still had almost everything going to the same place. In retrospect, I wish I had done that.
My parents have had a PO Box pretty my whole life and they’re also good if you have any concerns about large packages being left unattended on a porch. We share our front porch with a business so people are on it all day long going in and out of the business. We have one of those dinky little metal mailboxes on the side of the house so nothing bigger than an envelope can fit in there. So I always use my parents’ PO Box address when getting anything shipped to me. That way it says in the post office until I pick it up.
One of my credit cards had two different places to update an address on their website. I was getting normal mail from them so I didn’t notice the problem – until I was supposed to receive a new card and never did. They had sent it to my (doubly) old address because that was still in their main address field. So check for weird things like that. I’ve moved a zillion times, and that was a first for me.
Oh god yes, things that have a “postal address”, “billing address”, “contact address”, “misc address” and the rest drive me nuts. Especially online shopping, where you’re likely to have a bunch of friends and family addresses in there too, and you’ll suddenly find you’ve defaulted your billing to great auntie amy’s when you deleted your old shipping address.
Groans, that time it took me like 5 or more emails to get that one place to stop calling me Mrs. Hotel City, because I had something shipped there (Hotel City, c/o my name….) with amazon, and then amazon gave this other place my “new address” when I ordered something from them through amazon……….
Don’t forget your Dr/Dentist! Also your club memberships like Costco.
If you’re registered with a bone marrow donation registry, or anything like that. This probably falls under charitable giving, which has been mentioned already, but this one is one that’s SUPER easy to forget about, because normally, you don’t ever hear from them.
If your dog or cat is microchipped, don’t forget to change the address and phone number tied to that. So many chipped pets are not returned due to out dated information
Also any past employers from that year that need to send you tax info in the spring.
One that I forgot about…
Professional Licensure Boards.
You only hear from them at renewal time, so if you move midway through the active cycle you might forget. I did until that mail came nearly too late with the yellow forwarding sticker.