written by wolfram007 on 16/05/2022
Ancestry have stiched me up. They have auto-renewed membership and are refusing to refund even a day after payment taken. No cooling-off period. Customer Service could not care less. Very shabby during this cost of living crisis. This is hardly an essential spend.
written by Goodwin86 on 26/01/2022
Be very careful when using this service. The very moment you stop using it you must stop your auto renewal. They take the money from your account with no warning email. I know of no other service which does this.
written by ColinJames101 on 24/06/2021
You can sign up for a free trial but your credit card will be charged as soon as they can get away with it. And forget getting a refund you will waste more time in an attempt and grt nowhere. In my case I tried to get the useless Royal Bank of Scotland to cancel an impending payment they said I had to wait till the sum was taken from my account before I could report it. having done this I was told to get the company Ancestry to refund the money and the Royal Bank of Scotland could not help ( this took 43 minutes on the phone) Give Ancestry a miss Cheers
written by joaichroth on 03/01/2020
They took £99 from my bank account for a membership that I did not want to renew, what I spotted the debit a week later I asked for a refund, No they said. So they tool my money without permission and won't give it back!!
written by 354Robinson on 02/01/2018
The blurb says that Ancestry.co.uk gives access to all UK births, marriages and deaths records. This is simply not true. Scotland is part of the UK, but the site does not have full records from Scotland. All my family are from Scotland. I can only find a fraction of them on Ancestry, but when I use Scotlandspeople.gov.uk I can find most of them very easily.
written by OanaJoan on 01/11/2017
I initially signed up to the free trial and was excited to find out about my ancestry. However, I soon realised it was no use to me because I'm a Romanian national (and only then did I discover this...) Then, I never received my 'free' trial payment back and my subscription was auto-renewed, which I then cancelled. I emailed and requested a refund, however they simply pointed me to their terms and conditions and told me I couldn't have one. As a student, I feel stolen from, to be honest. Their auto-renewal is very sneaky. I definitely WOULD NOT recommend to anyone.
written by on 08/03/2017
I decided to cancel my £24.99p monthly subscription just after Xmas and done so on line. As soon as I pressed the cancel tab a message appeared telling me if I would reconsider cancelling they would offer me a free period until the end of May. I accepted the free offer but discovered a few days ago they had continued taking the monthly payment of £24.99p from my account. When I phoned asking for a refund they insisted they had no record of me cancelling and said they did not give refunds as I must have pressed the wrong button. I knew that was a barefaced lie because the offer of a free period is only generated if you press the cancellation tab. I am going to try and get in contact with some organisation that will investigate those people and close them down for good. I notice there are hundreds of complaints about them all over the internet. Something has to be done to put them out of business
written by on 17/12/2016
Tried to purchase 6 month gift subscription online via my computer and when that didn't work I tried my iPhone. Finally I rang them directly and the person I was speaking to had me on the phone for 15 minutes doing something that in the end wasn't even what I asked for. I quickly realised she wasn't even aware of the gift product Ancestry was offering! I hung up and now I'm going to find another present to give. Ancestry has lost out and left a horrible taste in my mouth before I have even gotten to try the service or give it to someone else!
written by KadenTerry235 on 11/10/2016
I have been a member of Ancestry UK for nearly ten years on and off. Over the years I have become increasingly frustrated by the many thousands of transcription errors. These errors have led me down blind alleys many many times now. It took me several years to find one ancestor in the 1881 cen because the family name "Tite" had been transcribed as"Yates". When you consider that from my own experience I have seen at least one error on nearly every page I've ever looked at. This includes 1841 to 1901 cen as well as parish record's,there must be thousands of very frustrated genealogists at this point. As far as I can see,Ancestry is NOT providing the service that it says it does. Unfortunately this situation is only going to be resolved by a complete review of all documents(Millions). So I wouldn't hold your breath for that.
written by keni010 on 06/10/2016
Re. Ancestry.co.uk Bought a Pay per view today in desperation trying to find a family member,..... (DON'T BUY ANYTHING FROM THIS SHODDY OUTFIT!... & DON'T BUY ANY OTHER SUBSCRIPTION WITH THIS UNPROFESSIONAL LOT, THESE PEOPLE ARE conning us, THEY TAKE YOUR MONEY AS QUICK AS YOU LIKE AND THEN WHEN THINGS GO WRONG THEY WASH THEIR HANDS OF YOU, I AM ABSOLUTELY FURIOUS, PLEASE READ ALL OF THIS, THEIR AFTER SALES SERVICE IS NONEXISTENT!.)..... the first viewing worked ok and merely confirmed what I had, the next one I clicked on, nothing happened so I thought, oh well, I'd try again and accept the single wasted credit. Nothing happened again.... so I wrote an email explaining what had happened or hadn't I should say, and got a reply within the hour saying in their opening line that they were sorry etc. and they would help me with this issue. I was relieved to read this. The very next line in that email said they were unable to reimburse a, (i.e. one) credit and advised that I clear my cookie cache implying that the fault was with me and not with their clearly useless programme. My email clearly stated that I had lost 2 credits and not ONE so they obviously don't read emails thoroughly before responding to any complainant, they clearly treat us with contempt because we complain at their inadequacies instead of addressing the issue . Tomorrow I am contacting Trading Standards and shall continue to pursue this until I am reimbursed, trust me, I'll spend as much time as it takes. MY ADVICE IS STICK TO A SITE CALLED, "thegenealogist.co.uk" it's an excellent site and they are really helpful. Also, to build a family tree use, "My Heritage", Their FAMILY TREE BOOK is brilliant where you can see everyone in the tree, I have over 3000 people in mine and the book has photo's as well as many different headings, dates, places, biographies etc. etc. mine has about 700 pages.....much better than any chart where you can only see 100 or less people. My friend transferred his tree via a gedcom file from Ancestry to My Heritage because of this and he's glad he did. The reason, incidentally, that I tried a pay per view is that I am stuck on a particular relative. I looked again after the two lost credits and Ancestry.Ripoff.uk didn't have what I wanted anyway. I shall be posting again after speaking with Trading Standards tomorrow. Please stay tuned!... I WILL be letting you know on this site what Trading Standards has to say.
written by Riley410 on 27/08/2016
I was cajollled into setting this up for my son to use through the summer? BIG MISTAKE! This is a liability - takes your credit card details, then it is impossible to cancel your trial subscription. Phone number doesnt connect. Online log in says details invalid when certain they are correct. The service may be useful for genealagists, but the financial side is little short of dishonest. I cannot recommend at all as I have no trust in them charging appropriately or being contactable to deal with problems. Avoid, avoid! Is this day and age, this kind of site should be taken down in my opinion.
written by on 25/07/2016
I joined up fot a free trial and cancelled two day's later having realised it was not for me (for a number of reasons ( including useless and incorrect 'hints'). I went through the cacellation process EXACTLY following the Ancestry procedure. This prompted a red box saying that i could continue to use the site as a guest. I assumed that was that until 10 day's later I noticed that an amount of money, representing a monthly instalment, had been taken from my bank account. I phoned Ancestry to be told that my "cancellation had not processed". I was also told that had the cancellation gone through I should have received an email with a 'cancellation number". I made the point that as I did not know I was supposed to get this then I would not be alerted when it did not arrive!! I also made the point that I had checked my Ancestry account before calling and there was no "cancel subscription" box on my account page which, according to Ancestry means that thereis no live subscription no that account!!! Maybe because i had cancellled???i was then toldo that no refund was posible. To get rid of the hassle I have written-off the money taken. Beware - exactly this has happened to many others on various review sites.
written by Reynaa380 on 05/04/2016
Fairy user friendly but its very limited in finding people and double checking. I or my mum don't even exist. Cancelled subscription however was charged in full again, ancestory not helpful when called.
written by Boctomp on 27/03/2016
This site couldn't even find my birth details so a complete waste of time.
written by on 27/01/2016
The new website layout is awful to use and feels as though it has been designed by children for children - what used to be a really enjoyable way to spend my time has now turned into a chore. I hardly log in to Ancestry now and have cancelled my annual membership which I had held for many years. Very sad that one of my favourite things to do has been ruined by Ancestry.
Written on: 23/03/2016
I totally agree with you. I feel that all my enjoyment on the website has been taken away, I feel that I don't want to go on it now and will not be renewing my contract with them. That dark grey screen drives me crazy and finding information doesn't seem to have any logic to it! I like you really enjoyed the old site.................... Bring it back.
written by on 26/01/2016
I absolutely hate the new Ancestry site. I have been an Ancester member for 10 relatively problem free years until the new site was introduced. Having had a trial run of the new format and becoming extremely frustrated with it, I reverted back to the old format, until I was informed that I had no choice as the old format was no longer available. The new site is very slow, I've given up attempting to move from one individual to another on the tree page as nothing moves, and I find individual profiles far too cluttered - it's bad enough having the details of an individual's relative on a person's profile, without having to contend with an historical time line also (although I am aware this can be removed). The tree colours are dreadful, and for some reason my recent contacts are now never available. I could go on, there are so many things which I dislike about the new site. It's not that I'm averse to change, but users pay a lot of money through their subscriptions and expect better. Unless things improve considerably, I shall certainly not be renewing mine.
written by Freemanxn91 on 23/12/2015
New layout is appaling. This was a serious genealogical site. Now it's just bells nd whistles for the dabbler who will use it a couple of times, then forget it. It' like gym membership: get your money and move on to the next sucker.
written by Clarke496 on 04/12/2015
I am absolutely amazed at this company. I ordered a birth cert of my father only to find out that this company has been taking out payments for the last 6 months. I rang twice to cancel two days after I had apparently joined. I was told I was not on their website so not to worry as they wouldn't be able to bill me. Now I find you have been doing it in my fathers name who is very dead, with my bank details but I was only offered one months payment back and basically tough you cannot have any more.
written by davidland43 on 27/11/2015
New format = plus for clarity of the timeline and the inclusion of major life events for close family members. Minus (strong) for changing placenames from what they were at the time of events to present day, no doubt 'politically correct' names. A really bad example is translating Sebastopol in Russia in the Crimean War to the Ukraine. Thoroughly irritating is Ceylon, at the time of the Indian Mutiny, to 'Western Sri Lanka'.
written by 142Lloyd on 29/10/2015
The photo gallery is not easy to use and placing a photo to a person is not easy. I have searched for a known relative in the electoral rolls with no result with exact name and location, however I had another account with a cometitor of Ancestry UK and found the person and downloaded a copy of electoral roll in the eaarly 1900's
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Keni010's Response to keni010's Review
Written on: 06/10/2016
6/10/16..... Ancestry have realised they were wrong and have reimbused the 2 credits. My fury has subsided!