Man changes name to trick IT systems and saves money

Jonathan David is a Computer Engineering and Theoretical Physics graduate – and he reckons he’s just saved himself over 14,000 Euros. Last year David changed his name to ‘Raven Felix Null’ – and since many IT systems can’t register ‘Null’ as a name, he’s finding he can bypass paying for things like hotel bills and car rentals. The BBC recently wrote an article about people who encounter technical problems related to their name, but Raven chose to change his to see if he could get free stuff when computer systems refuse to register his name. Seems completely ludicrous, right? But according to Raven, it’s working – for some things, at least. ‘I have probably managed to save somewhere around $15,000 (£10,500). The best deal I got was not having to pay for my root canal which would have cost around $1,500′, David said.

From Independent newspaper