I had to convince people to let me on board a plane because my name contain a swedish letter (å). Their computer system translated it into "aa", which then didn't match my passport.

[–] someguy3@lemmy.world 8 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

That one I can actually see, having an extra letter that doesn't match. Dropped punctuation or symbols (whatever the flair is called) though personally I wouldn't care.

[–] wieson@feddit.org 19 points 1 month ago (1 children)

That's the wrong way of looking at an å.

It's not just an a with decoration. It actually has different pronunciation and is typically replaced with aa if no å is available. (I'm neither Swedish nor Norwegian, so not 100% sure, but it's what happened to Erling Haaland).

Similarly, you would replace a German ä with ae. So if my name was Bäcker, it would be wrong to spell it Backer on a ticket. Baecker would be the way.

[–] someguy3@lemmy.world 3 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Yes I'm aware it's not an a with decoration jfc. I'm saying for computer entries that garble things, I wouldn't care about matching it up so perfectly (with dropped whatever those things are called) as to not allow someone to board a plane.

[–] Hawke@lemmy.world 1 points 1 month ago

“Diacritics” is the word you are looking for.

And unfortunately the kind of people who decide whether people get to board a plane do care about that stuff.

[–] ryedaft@sh.itjust.works 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Your name is transliterated in your passport? That's on the Swedish authorities then.

[–] pmk@lemmy.sdf.org 11 points 1 month ago (1 children)

No, my passport has my real name of course, with "å". In the airport system and on the boarding pass my name was spelled with "aa".

[–] ryedaft@sh.itjust.works 0 points 1 month ago

I'm amazed that none of your family members have run into the same problem. If I were you I would compare passports with my family.