Ancestry
Reviews and Complaints

I recently left a 1-star review after a significant amount of my personal data went missing from my online family tree, and I was worried that it was gone forever. However, I want to be fair to Ancestry.com and now I am writing an updated review to commend them for their prompt and professional response. They contacted me almost immediately and asked specific questions about the missing data in order to investigate the issue. Later on, they informed me that they were actively working on resolving the matter. To my surprise, within a week, all of the deleted information was restored! They went above and beyond to make me feel like a valued customer. I am grateful to Ancestry.com for their exceptional service. Thank you, Ancestry.com!

I purchased Ancestry in January of 2023. I did get the kit. Returned it and got my results. Seven months later I happen to be going through my credit card statement and I see a charge of $79.95 for a subscription to Ancestry. I called customer service and was told that when I purchased Ancestry, I agreed to a research account subscription and that I would be billed $1 a month for three months and then had the option to cancel at that point. I am somewhat to blame because I didn’t read the fine print, but I still feel this is a very deceptive practice. They advised me that they have a no refund policy. I will never deal with Ancestry.com again.

On 8/9/2023 I received an email informing me that my Ancestry account would be updated, and I would be charged. Unfortunately, I receive many emails, some of which are fraudulent. So, I ignored this one, principally because the body of it said "To You" instead of my name. In the moment I thought it was a proposal instead of an automatic renewal.

I formerly found Ancestry.com useful. But once I learned the basics of my genealogy, I found that I was no longer interested. I would have specifically cancelled if I had read the email correctly.

Because of my error my bank account was debited $229.00 on 9/12/2023.

I am requesting either:

1. A full refund of the $229.00, or

2. A partial refund prorated to subtract a reasonably small amount for the short time I had a renewal.

My yearly subscription went from $149/yr to $319/yr.

Totally unsatisfactory.

Please find a way to fix this for this fixed income senior citizen.

From [protected] I was paying $299/yr for wem.

In 2016 it dropped to $149/yr until 2022 where it rose to $319/yr.

Totally unacceptable.

No one doubles their subscription price in one year.

Please review and provide some relief.

Within the last 2 - 3 months I have noticed I am getting contacted by quite a few people through Ancestry who's only intention is to either scam or be "looking for someone to date, etc." I'm 72, been married for 50 years and need neither. I love geneology and have found out quite a bit about our family history because of other family members research (the old fashioned way) or just by paying attention to my elders while growing up! Every time I log on I get "Hello dear, how are you today" "Hope you are doing well!" , etc. I usually block them and in some cases they magically are unblocked within a few days! There seems to be no way to delete them. Today I finally answered, "Are we related? I got back, no I just saw your name and thought it would be nice to meet you! He came back he has a son, he is stationed with the U.S. military in Syria and now I am REALLY concerned! I told him my account was for my personal research only. I am afraid if this "harassment" continues I have no recourse but to cancel my membership! I have not mentioned this to my husband who will probably be mortified! I doubt there will be any changes but I'm sure you will hear from other Ancestry members.

I paid for the test for my Dad as a gift & paid to get the results on your site & I am paying each month for his info. on your site. No one else! I have contacted you to CANCEL paying for his acct. & you told me that I need his okay to cancel this even though I am the one paying for it! It says my name on the damn credit card & he doesn't even know about this or care! I want to STOP paying for this every month! It is too damn expensive! I want my credit card for this taken off & NO more payments. I do not want to delete the site for his info., just make him a guest or freeze his account. Whatever you do when you are not receiving any more money from someone. I feel this is a total rip-off & SCAM & I would NOT recommend you to friends or relatives! I do NOT want to be billed anymore for this account & I want someone from Ancestry to HELP me w/this & resolve this instead of giving me the runaround!

This company is a total rip-off! First you pay for the kit. $180.00. Then when you get the kit, you can't navigate the website without paying another $40.00 a month for hints. Then if you want to see your personality traits, it's another $20.00 and on and on. And then, after all that, it is nearly impossible to navigate the website to 'build a tree'. Completely frustrating! This company is not transparent with the public. Bait and switch behavior.

My name is Dorothy Randol and on May 1, 2023, I paid for a DNA test for my grandson, Michael Larkin. He received his kit but lost his return label. He called and received another label which he used to return his kit. He waited and waited but never received his results.

Finally on June 22, he called and was told that all he had to do was set up a conference call between Ancestry, me and himself and a new kit would be sent. On June 29, we had a 3-way conference call with a very nice young lady who researched everything and at that time told us that on May 8, the test kit was cancelled. No one contacted us to tell us this had happened, and we have no idea why it was cancelled. We absolutely did NOT cancel!

• The total cost of the DNA test kit, $68.95, was charged to my credit card on May 1, 2023

• On my June statement I received a refund from Ancestry for $53.95, dated June 1, 2023

All we want is to have a new test sent to Michael for $53.95 so I would not have to pay the current price and pay additional fees. I got the special Mother’s Day rate.

The young lady spoke to her supervisor who said that was not possible. We were finally put through to the supervisor, his name is Andres. Michael and I both tried to explain the situation and to please make an exception. He would not budge. We were on the line with him for at least half an hour or more. I kept asking him to ‘fix it’ and please send us another kit for $53.95. He kept repeating the same thing over and over and over.

“You can order a new test kit at the regular price. Ancestry could not have made a mistake and cancelled the order. You had to have cancelled it. There is a nonrefundable $15.00 shipping/return fee.”

With both Michael and I trying to ask for help in getting this accomplished, Michael did raise his voice. Andres told him to stop swearing. Michael did not swear, but he did raise his voice. Michael put himself on mute and I continued to try to get Andres to help us. He said there was no one else above him to talk to and just kept repeating that we cancelled the order, and we could order a new test kit at the current price.

He finally said for me to have a beautiful day…really? At that point I just hung up. However, Michael unmuted and got back on the line and unfortunately did swear at him. He knows he shouldn’t have done that but we both were so frustrated with Andres’ uncaring attitude and inability to provide good customer service.

I really love Ancestry.com, I have a family tree, and always look at all the updated information you provide me about my relatives and all the great new information regarding my DNA.

Is there anyone in your organization who can help us? If so, please charge my credit card on file $53.95 and send a new test kit to:

Michael Larkin

1107 Chesaning Road

St. Charles, MI 48655

Thank you,

Dorothy Randol

[protected]@gmail.com

[protected]

The way the site works is that you gotta pay an upfront annual amount, but the wording on their web site indicates you can cancel at a later date and still receive a refund. But let me tell you, it's not that easy. The site is deceptive as it does not make clear the fact that you will not receive a refund if you don't cancel within the very short period from the time of taking out the subscription. It does not clearly state that you will not receive a refund if you pay the annual amount and you cancel after two months for example. It's like they're trying to trick you into paying for something you might not even want anymore.

I was hoping to find some old classmates, you know, see what they're up to these days. But out of twenty searches, using name and age, it found not one. Even those who had passed away, three former students, not one was found. It was totally useless. I mean, what's the point of paying all that money if you can't even find what you're looking for?

Having paid $215, it was a complete waste of money and very disappointing as a search tool. I contacted them and even though they would know I used the site in a very limited fashion, and it also failed to deliver, they would not offer any refund at all. This web site is based in typical American aka Microsoft greed style of taking peoples money deceptively, and is happy to receive $215 for about 2 hours use of their data base. $215 allows you to use the site for 24 hours a day for 365 days. I used it for 2 hours. If you rang a small business in Australia for a refund under similar circumstances you'd probably get it. Having had previous experience in business with American companies it is no wonder "the world hates America" - it's been ripping the rest of us off forever and it does not care.

Now, I know some people love Ancestry and swear by it. But I think what they're doing with the monthly/yearly business is pretty sleazy and really hurts their reputation. It's like they're trying to trap you into paying for something you might not even want anymore. So, if you're thinking about using Ancestry, just be careful and read the fine print. Don't get caught up in their tricky business tactics.

I have been a member of Ancestry for quite some time now, and I must say that my recent experience with them has left me quite disappointed. I wanted to get a DNA test for my 90-year-old mother, who is not very computer-savvy. I thought I could manage her test for her, but unfortunately, Ancestry requires that every person taking a DNA test have their own email and account. This was quite a hassle for me, as I didn't want to create another account in my mother's name and explaining all of this to her would just make her nervous.

I don't understand why Ancestry needs separate accounts for each person taking a DNA test. It seems like an unnecessary step that only adds to the confusion. I also question the "protection" these accounts afford, as they could easily be faked. I don't see how my mother would be more protected by this system. Ancestry did refund my money, but the whole experience was disappointing and not at all what I had hoped for.

Another issue I have with Ancestry is that they seem more interested in getting people to take DNA tests than in helping people with genealogical research. The site is flooded with the results of people who have no genealogical research connections to their DNA results. Without this research, all an Ancestry DNA test will give you is a few cultural percentages and probable immigration patterns. It may suggest a few cousins to you, but without additional research, you will have no way of knowing how or if you are connected to these people.

I have been a member of Ancestry since 2007, and I must say that I am disappointed with the direction the company has taken in the past couple of years. I wish there was another service I could use besides Ancestry.

I gotta say, I've had some issues with Ancestry since I signed up for their subscription. But hey, I'm not alone, right? I mean, I've heard some horror stories from other folks out there. Anyway, I started off with the Free 2-week Trial, but about halfway through, I decided to call them up and see if they had any special deals going on. Lo and behold, they told me about a Memorial Day Weekend offer for 1-month of All Access for $31. They said they'd send me an email with the details, but I never got it. So, on the day the offer was supposed to expire, I called them up again. This time, I actually got someone who was nice and helpful. They told me that the offer was actually for 6-months of All Access for $99, which was a way better deal! So, I signed up for it.

But then, when my free trial ended, I found out that I didn't actually qualify for the offer. And to make matters worse, I couldn't get the remaining time on my trial added back. So, I asked to speak to a supervisor and explained the situation. And you know what? They actually put the offer through for me! I was pretty happy about that.

But then, the real problems started. I had constant issues with the website. ThruLines wasn't working at all, even though my tree met all the requirements. And every day, there was some new problem. And of course, they always tried to blame it on my computer, browser, or internet connection. I got pretty fed up with their excuses and lies, and I admit, I got pretty nasty with them a few times. But eventually, things started to work again. And to make up for all the hassle, they gave me an extra 7 months of All Access.

Overall, I'd say that Ancestry is a company that you really have to stay on top of. And more often than not, you'll have to argue with them to get things done. I mean, half the people I talked to didn't even seem to know how the website worked! But hey, if you're willing to put up with the headaches, you might just find some really interesting stuff on there.

Ancestry is a website that provides access to a vast library of information about family history. However, since they moved to 'New' Ancestry, the website has had a lot of problems. It is a poor substitute for the product that was in place until last December. The 'New' Ancestry continues to have lots of problems, and it is frustrating for users.

I haven't had many technical difficulties with Ancestry, but today I had a serious issue. I tried to use the online function to submit a Help request, but the online support submission form error'ed out twice, and it would not go through. I had to call the customer support number, and I waited for 22 minutes, listening to their commercials. Finally, I got the operator, who was pleasant enough, but she couldn't resolve my problem. A ticket had to be submitted to the developers, and who knows when my problem will be fixed. She did, however, try to sell me other Ancestry offerings, even though the one I have has problems.

Ancestry has great libraries of information, but they are a MARKETING COMPANY, selling stuff. Don't pay a lot of attention to the slick TV shows or the commercials. Ancestry doesn't care about you, the customer, and your family history. You are $$$ only to them.

UPDATE 6/22/2016

Customer Support is non-existent. If you send an email to their Support email address, you get an auto-reply with directions to fill out an online form. IT DOESN'T WORK! If you try calling their Support about a tree technical issue, you get put on hold for up to 20 to 25 minutes, and then you get an operator who doesn't know anything except to say that the problem will be submitted to the developers for investigation. AND THEN NOTHING WILL EVER HAPPEN, YOUR PROBLEM WILL NOT GET FIXED. Watch their TV show, watch their advertising, BUT DO NOT BUY THEIR PRODUCTS!

Ancestry.com has some issues that you should be aware of before you decide to use it. Firstly, you may be paying for information that is available for free on other websites. For example, birth certificates, marriage certificates, death certificates, and census information can be found on other sites that don't charge for access. Some sites even allow Ancestry.com to use their information for free, but don't allow them to charge the public for it. One such site is Find-a-Grave.

Secondly, you may come across many family trees that contain conflicting information. This can be frustrating because you can't be sure which information is accurate. Some trees won't have dates at all, while others use terms like "about" or "after" in front of dates. You have to weed through the garbage much like a detective to determine what is correct and what is not.

Thirdly, the search functions on Ancestry.com are not very good. They pull up too many results that don't match the search, and no matter how you try to limit or add information to a search, the results are much the same. This means that there is too much information to review, and 99% of it is useless and a waste of time. When you are looking at thousands of results, you will likely give up after about 5 or 6 pages of results.

Fourthly, if you decide to cancel your membership, be aware that all the birth certificates, death certificates, census reports, etc. that you searched for will no longer be available to you. This means that you paid for the information, but if you cancel your membership, you can't review it again. To avoid this, it's a good idea to print out copies of all the official documents that you found to verify information in your tree. Keep them in a separate file so that you can review the information again without having to pay for it again.

Finally, make sure your tree is set to private. This way, no one can steal your pictures or stories. If you don't set your tree to private, your pictures may end up on other trees without your permission. If this happens, it can be difficult to get them removed. Some people may even tell you to "screw off" because they paid for them.

Overall, Ancestry.com can be a useful tool for researching your family history, but it's important to be aware of its limitations and potential issues. Keep these things in mind when using the site, and you should be able to avoid any major problems.

I just wanted to share my experience with ancestry.com's free trial. Let me tell you, it was a complete nightmare. I signed up for the free trial and canceled it after only 5 days. However, I was charged for 4 months after that! It was a real hassle to get it sorted out. I had to make several phone calls and even cancel online twice. I'm still not sure if my subscription is canceled or not. The whole process was a mess from start to finish. It took me a good 30 minutes just to get to the cancellation page. I was put on hold for a long time while I was waiting to speak to someone. While I was on hold, I decided to try and cancel online. After navigating through several pages, I finally found the cancellation page. I clicked the cancel button and it said I was canceled. But then, the person on the phone told me that I couldn't cancel online and that I had to call. I was confused because I had just canceled online. She then told me that I was already canceled, which didn't make any sense because I had canceled after only 5 days of the free trial. I shouldn't have been charged at all. To make matters worse, they asked me if I wanted to continue my membership even though I had just ranted to them about wanting a refund. It was ridiculous! I was only supposed to have a free trial, but I ended up being charged for 4 months. Finally, after several minutes on hold, the person on the phone told me that she would make a one-time exception and refund me for the last month. If I don't see the refund in my account soon, I'm going to cancel my card so they can't charge me anymore. I apologize for any typos in this review. I used talk-to-text to write it. I just want to warn others that ancestry.com's free trial is a trap. You really need to read the terms of service carefully. If you do decide to try it, I recommend calling to cancel right away.

Ancestry used to be a great company, but now they've changed everything about the family research experience. I've been paying for a yearly subscription to have access to all the records, but now I can't even place ancestor pictures where I want them. I used to be able to add my own photos and media and attach them to certain census dates, but that's not possible anymore. Ancestry has taken it upon themselves to insert certain stories and media that pertain to a certain era in which my personal ancestor was living. I didn't give them permission to make these changes, and I don't appreciate it.

The new format is not user-friendly and difficult to navigate. The color is a horrible gray that hurts my eyes after just a few minutes of reading. It's not good for the eyes at all. The new site is cumbersome and not enjoyable to use. I paid for the old classic ancestry, and that's what I want. All the joy has been taken from family research, and I'm ready to quit.

When I've tried to let ancestry know about things I didn't like, they told me I was just whining and didn't explain what I didn't like. I've explained numerous times, but they don't seem to care. They've even told me that if I don't like it, I can leave. That's not good business. They should be listening to their customers who are serious researchers. We want the classic. It works! They should at least give us the choice instead of forcing the new on us.

Ancestry has lost all good ethics and is only interested in becoming a bigger money-grubbing corporation. I used to recommend them to everyone, but not anymore. I would not recommend ancestry to anyone. They don't care about furthering family research; they have another agenda.

I received an Ancestry DNA kit as a Christmas gift in December of 2018. I was excited to learn more about my family history and followed the instructions to register the kit on an account I opened and mailed the kit in the first week of January 2019.

However, I never received any updates about the progress or receipt of my kit by Ancestry. After waiting for a few weeks, I decided to call their customer service on 2/6/19. I spoke to a customer service representative named Matt, who seemed to be fumbling and lacked knowledge about my kit. After a half hour of waiting, Matt finally located the kit number I provided. He then informed me that Ancestry personnel had entered my email address incorrectly on their end. He said it was an error on their part and could not be corrected because of the way their program was designed. He promised to mail me a new kit and we double-checked the shipping information to ensure they had the correct name and address.

On 2/11/19, I still had not received the kit, so I called again and spoke to Brenda. She told me it would take 7 to 10 days to receive it. I gave her the original kit number and asked her to check the date Matt mailed it out. After another 30 minutes of waiting, she told me she couldn't find any record of it being sent. I gave her all the shipping information again and she said she would send out a replacement kit that same day.

On 2/25/19, I still had not received the kit, so I called again and spoke to Crystal. After explaining everything again, Crystal told me they had no record of a kit being sent to me. I asked to speak to a supervisor, but Crystal balked and put me on hold until one was available. After another 15 minutes of waiting, Crystal was back telling me the supervisor was still busy, but she would send another kit out. We carefully went over the shipping details and she provided me with a confirmation number.

Today is 3/11/19 and I still have not received the kit. I called again today hoping to speak to a supervisor, but the recording said there would be at least a 30 minute wait to speak to a customer representative. I had other things to do and could not wait any longer.

I gave all this information to Ancestry in an email survey and gave them a 1-star rating, saying I would never recommend them to a friend. The automated survey responded to the 1-star rating and asked why. I explained everything and have never heard back from them. I also sent an email through their website to customer service, but received zero response. Overall, I am extremely disappointed with Ancestry's customer service and would not recommend them to anyone.

This app used to be great, but now it's a complete mess. The new design is just terrible. The background is so dark and depressing, it's like you're on the dark web or something. And it's hard to read the writing on that background, so you end up looking at your dirty phone screen. The green and white interface was so much better. I hate everything about this app now. It takes forever to load things and there are so many ridiculous extra steps to do anything. You used to be able to tag and add a description to a photo right away, but now you have to go through six steps just to add a photo. And the messaging system is just as bad. You can only see a few words of the previous message, and the box you're typing in is so small and narrow that you have no idea how the paragraph will look once it's translated to full view. It's just terrible design all around. I really hope the company sells and gets a good team back in who knows how to create a site with ease of use again. These new features look like they were designed for a video game portal rather than a site for grown-ups. It's confusing, ugly, complicated, and unusable.

Ancestry.com is a website that claims to help people trace their family history and find their ancestors. However, my experience with this website has been nothing but a waste of time. The database is full of incorrect information, and it seems like anyone can add their family tree to the website, which leads to a lot of misspellings and incorrect links. I spent a year trying to enter my family tree and make it public, but it was never found by any search method, whether I was logged in or logged out.

One of the biggest issues with Ancestry.com is that it is not fully compatible with any device. Whether you're using a PC, Mac, iPad, iPhone, or Android, there is always a glitch that makes it impossible to use the website. Whenever I tried to add or correct information in the tree, the software glitched out, making it impossible to make any changes.

Another issue is that inviting family members to the tree never worked. The other party could never manage to follow the many steps to eventually access the tree. It seems like the coders who do the programming should be replaced with people who actually know what they are doing.

At the end of the day, I have a tree on Ancestry.com that only I can look at properly on my computer at home. None of my family members could ever access it from their computers at their homes and add info to make the tree bigger. When I searched for more ancestors, I ended up not finding accurate information. Instead, I was inundated with names that were incorrectly written up, birth and death dates that were false, and locations that were false. It was clear that someone in a nowhere country made this data up.

Ancestry.com claims to have historical databases, but they are usually filled with only royal names. This is because in the past, only wealthy people, usually blue-blooded, could afford to read and write and leave historical documents behind. The historical databases they claim to have are freely accessible only if you go there directly, but Ancestry.com will charge you an arm and a leg for info coming from those libraries. And even then, the information is false almost 10 out of 10 times when using Ancestry.com website searches.

Support is incompetent and never even speaks your language. I wonder where they get money from. They should have gone bankrupt a long time ago, looking at that track record of the site and what it claims to be able to do, but it fails to do at the end of the day. If you want to find accurate information about your ancestors, I suggest looking elsewhere.

I’m writing this to inform you that I am making a complaint because I am absolutely furious about your DNA service.

My daughter (Sarah Louise Olding - email: [protected]@hotmail.com) is a member on your site, and is researching her family trees’ history. She has found out some information about her father’s side of the family and sent a DNA sample from her Aunty who is her father’s sister and apparently her Aunty’s DNA doesn’t match my daughter (I have no idea how this works) and now somehow she thinks that her father is NOT her father and that I’ve been lying to her for all these years which I can assure you this is not the case. I have no idea how your site works and quite frankly, I’m not interested either but for the fact that this is causing an awful lot of bitterness and stress between my daughter and myself over this LIE for want of a better word and all coming from your DNA testing site!. I think you should think long and hard about all these DNA tests and information you send out because there is speculation on the website that they are NOT 100% or even close to it as in my daughter's case.

I think you should explain to my daughter about all this and the negativity that goes with it as its caused enough tears and heartache otherwise I will be seeking legal advise about this.

I would very much like confirmation of this complaint.

Pauline King

I have an account with this old email vivian. [protected]@gmail.com with password a00083961 but when I tried to login it would not allow me this email was hacked. I had to close my email only but I never asked for my account with ancestry to be closed. I really don't want to have to start my family tree again when it took for ever for my mother to provided that to me. she is not mentally able to do it again she can't remember anything, can we please retrieve this account again please again. I really need this can we please have it set up with this email vivian. [protected]@gmail.com and send me a temporary password. am asking again can we please retrieve this account again.

My daughter purchased dna kit for me & on my profile a suspected half sister posted two photos & under the photos it said father. Upon calling your company they couldn’t give me any information if she is or isn’t a dna match. They couldn’t give any solid answers. I am in limbo trying to figure out if she is a dna match. The whole reason I went on. To me I find it disturbing that anyone can just post photos on your site without it being legitimate.

"My"Thru Lines"does not show my 4th ggrandfather, John Magee Jr., b. 1760 Duplin, British Colonial NC d. 1828 Pike County, MS or his wife, my 4th ggrandmother, Bethany Cordelia Scott b. 1766 • Duplin County, NC d. 1835 Walthall County, MS"

I have called [protected] and the person I talked to could not help me.

These two people (John and Bethaney Cordelia) show up as 4th ggrand uncle and aunt.

This is a case of 2 brothers, John, Jr. and Jacob Magee, married two sisters, Bethaney Cordelia and Mary Scott. A child of each of these marriages married each other, to wit: John Jackson "Jackey" Magee 1795–1862, child of Jacob and Mary, married Clarissa Magee (1798–1837), daughter of John and Bethaney Cordelia Magee. Their union produced my 2nd ggrandmother Catherine Magee 1823–1875.

Jacob Magee and Mary Scott Magee do show up as my 4th greatgrandparents, but John, jr. and Bethaney Cordelia DO NOT SHOW UP.

What is the problem? They show up in my tree, but not ThruLines.

I want this corrected please.

Sally Sue Seay Smith