Find My Past Searches

[Sue Mackay]

But I am sure it will be on WDYTYA or UTube,

I actually found this YouTube video on using the new search quite helpful. There were a couple of things I hadn't realised you can now do.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VOEi_nLLkRw

[Ladkyis]

I spent a while last night clicking. That's right, I overcame that secret fear that if I click the wrong thing something dreadful will happen and I clicked on stuff in FMP.

Suddenly I had choices and I was able to find things. It didn't ignore me! When I specofoed gender it didn't continue to give me both genders as Ancestry does ( that really gets me annoyed) When I said a specific part of the world it gave me that place. It is so different and I hate change but I will continue to use my subscription and I will master this new fangled website.

[Megan Roberts]

One thing that they have done is to restore the ability to scroll through parish registers - in other words you have to have a transcription to see an original, although you do need one to begin with.

As with a lot of the new layout its not blatantly obvious but appears half way down the original view on each side of the view as either < or >.

[Guy Etchells]

Sarah, editor of WDYTYA magazine was fazed by being in front of the camera for the recorded part of the interview.
She did however have a good chance to ask relevant questions of Paul Nixon and Myko Clelland from FindMyPast prior to this, so she did get answers to her questions.

I was lucky enough to have a chance to have a good talk with Paul on Friday evening in Dunfermline prior to the SAFHS conference.
I can assure forum members the website was beta tested prior to being opened to UK subscribers but that action through up addition problems. The techies are working round the clock to put things right.
However due to additional datasets coming online both now and in the future meant that things could not stay as they were previous to the "upgrade".

One thing is certain it is as frustrating for FindMyPast as it is for their subscribers and they are doing everything possible to resolve the situation.
Cheers
Guy

[raineshoe]

Have to say I've still had no response to FMP from them since I started this thread. I've contacted them several times through several different methods and nothing. I have found many of the searches I did previously where I got instant results are now difficult to search, don't produce results or something else happens. I feel I've wasted my membership fee this year and have not had the luxury of a discount like some others have managed (not that I'm bothered about that I just want good search facilities). I have now completely given up with them and the contempt they have shown for their customers. I have been a member since they were 1837online so it seems they are happy to alienate longstanding customers with the current situation and its water off a ducks back. Glad they can afford to do so. I am not a happy customer by a long chalk.

[margarita]

Have to say I've still had no response to FMP from them since I started this thread. I've contacted them several times through several different methods and nothing.

I feel I've wasted my membership fee this year and have not had the luxury of a discount like some others have managed (not that I'm bothered about that I just want good search facilities). I have now completely given up with them and the contempt they have shown for their customers.

You have taken the words out of my mouth.

I am just about to contact them again. I am getting more enraged about the lack of response than I am about using their searches, as I have given up using them.

Maggie

[Ken_R]

One thing is certain it is as frustrating for FindMyPast as it is for their subscribers and they are doing everything possible to resolve the situation.
Cheers
Guy

Guy. With all due respect. Whilst those at FMP are feeling the frustration and, no doubt their 'techies' are on supplemented payments, the 'customers', having paid their 'monies', are having to endure a quality of service that is, somewhere in the region of between 'below par' to 'unusable'.

As an example, I've found that having selected an Image, in the time that it takes to appear, I can select 'Download', [the Image], allocate a File Name, Save it to my hard drive, and then view it in an Image Viewer on my hard drive, long before it appears on the FMP Viewer.

In essence, the Viewer that FMP are using, and thereby imposing upon us 'customers' appears to be 'Bandwidth Hungry' such that those of us with less modern machines, and without a Fibre connection, results in not just seconds but, minutes, of awaiting for Images to load.

Such is not 'resolvable' (unless FMP wish to pay for a Fibre link for all their customers). If A.N. Other site(s) can provide a satisfactory viewing platform [for images] then why is it beyond the capabilities of FMP?

Edited to add,
Guy, I wasn't intending to 'shoot the messenger'.

[raineshoe]

I can certainly sympathise Maggie and share your frustration.

As for the quote below, I have fallen about laughing. If this was beta tested its the biggest joke going. Any fool can see that it wasn't suitable for release, but judging by FMPs pure contempt for their customers I suspect they are sitting back clutching our pennies in their hot little hands and laughing all the way to the bank

As for Ancestry they've always taken a lot of flack, but they are by far a superior service now by a long chalk.

I can assure forum members the website was beta tested prior to being opened to UK subscribers
Guy

[Megan Roberts]

In essence, the Viewer that FMP are using, and thereby imposing upon us 'customers' appears to be 'Bandwidth Hungry' such that those of us with less modern machines, and without a Fibre connection, results in not just seconds but, minutes, of awaiting for Images to load.

Ken

If anyone has read any of my earlier posts they will know that I am no fan of FMP, but I don't have a fibre optic connection, and I am able to load images.

However, I suspect that you are right to assume that everything has been tailored to the formats that they deem best, which is one of the reasons that people using the Internet Explorer browser really struggled and they had to issue special instructions on how such people (including me) could access their site.

At the bottom of their home page they are now advertising their next thing - Capture for iPhone. So I strongly suspect that a lot of the formatting issues that continue to be complained about come from their tailoring their site for mobile devices.

I am thinking of suggesting to a friend of mine who lectures on project management, that he should use the debacle as a case study of how not to do something, starting with "who launches something new on April Fool's Day?".

Megan

[Sue Mackay]

I used the Contact Us button on the site to ask what the procedure now is for submitting corrections - I have found five baptisms in Pembrokeshire that have been indexed with the mother's middle name as the surname, as in all cases the surname was written on the line below. Previously they were very quick to either accept or reject corrections and take appropriate action.

The good news is that I received an e-mail in reply within 24 hours.

The bad news is that there is no longer a mechanism for submitting corrections