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FindMyPast has been a fantastic site for UK genealogists for quite a few years. The quality of its records has been excellent. Its search engine has been very good, especially when you compare it to most of the other genealogy websites - it was straightforward and intuitive, you could search using common sense, it wasn't trying to be too clever for its own good.....all in all I was extremely happy with FMP and worked on it several days every week for years. OK, nothing is perfect, but FMP was pretty damned good. I had no hesitation in recommending it as the best starting point for anyone wanting to start their family tree, or for those looking for a good replacement for another site.
Fast-Forward to the middle of March 2014. The reasoning behind the changes FindMyPast have made are probably many and varied. The way they have managed the change has been, at best, misguided, and at worst an absolute Farce. Notwithstanding replacing the old search engine with a new fangled, whistles and bells, click here, filter there, monstrosity, but their customer-care went completely down the pan, out of the window, and away with the fairies!
Immediately that customers began to be moved over to the new "platform", the queries and complaints started to roll in. By the first week in April, the Customer Support phone lines had been turned off and the only way to contact direct was via the online contact form. People complained that they sent several emails in, but nothing came back out to them. FMP's Facebook page was deluged, and the subsequent melee resulted in a number of people finding themselves blocked from inputting and all of their posts deleted. FMP declared that this was none of their doing and must be down to Facebook's spamming tool recognising repetition - strange that the oft repeated words on the FMP posts were never deleted and FMP blocked.
Problems brought to notice included:
Not being able to log onto the site at all. After several weeks, the situation is still the same for some subscribers. FMP blamed (**) PCs, browsers; in fact everything including their customers' abilities in being able to operate a computer. Everything was working fine at their end.
Even when people made a successful search, there were numerous reports of not being able to open the image. Again, this was apparently down to (**) as above.
Instead of there being one search screen for a record set, there were several, and no two had the same search box options - no Date of Marriage option on the BMD screen to go with the Date of Birth and Date of Death was an obvious one. As was the Date of Death on Burial record search screens.
Census address searching ability was non-existant. As indeed was searching on a Place of Birth. Again there were a number of different places you could enter a Place of Birth, but actually having matches come back was an adventure in optimism.
There are so many problems listed - anyone interested can go to any one of these websites (although there are further websites containing reviews:
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=681106.0
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=682699.0
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=679363.0
http://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=683778.new#new
http://www.findmypast.co.uk The Feedback Forum has currently over 2200 comments.
http://www.reviewcentre.com
http://www.trustpilot.co.uk/review/www.findmypast.co.uk, http://www.whodoyouthinkyouaremagazine.com/forum/topic10499.html
A Facebook page was set up by disgruntled customers https://www.facebook.com/pages/Cant-Find-My-Past/1405864143017930?fref=nf
And during all of this, FMP's senior management were conspicuous only by their absence. Customers naturally became more and more irate. FMP asserted that they had had thousands of positive responses to the new site, but these were also conspicuous by their absence. Discontent spread around the world with subscribers from Australia, US, and Ireland adding their voices.
And where are we now - 4 weeks in?
FMP are obviously wanting to raise their profile and challenge the bigger genealogy sites. Well, they are certainly raising it, but not in the way that they hoped.
It has been suggested that FMP are aiming to expand and target the younger generation, who would use tablets and mobiles on the move - hence the design of the new "platform" which would not display on PCs etc, and which letters were in a very juvenile font.
They seem to have forgotten that their core customers are older and a little wiser - not to mention rather IT savvy - after all it was this generation that actually invented and developed the computers and systems being used today.
Their biggest own goal, out of quite a few recent ones, is that they have failed to take account of the power of the internet. Today's news is no longer tomorrow's chip paper. Reviews posted here will be here for years.
In summary, I would not recommend FindMyPast.com to a friend.
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