Ancestry: Family History & DNA

The app is great and I’ve enjoy the features. The only issue is, every once in a while I’m not able to log in when I’m clearly inputting my logging information correctly. I’ll even confirm in doing so by logging in successfully on my MacBook Air laptop. So it appears to be an application issue.

I genuinely enjoyed using Ancestry and was planning to be a customer for years. Unfortunately, an account problem completely destroyed my trust in the platform. I was suddenly logged out of my account and could no longer receive password-reset emails. I contacted Ancestry for help, and their AI directed me to sign in through Google. I followed those instructions, only to have a completely new account created instead of regaining access to my existing account. I NEVER deleted my original account. I spent weeks contacting Ancestry and trying to get this resolved. My original account contained years of family research, trees, records, membership payments, and my AncestryDNA results. I was even willing to accept rebuilding my family tree from scratch if Ancestry could at least help me recover my DNA results. Instead, customer service repeatedly told me that my account had been deleted and that there was absolutely nothing they could do. What makes this even more frustrating is that Ancestry told me I had “accidentally” deleted my account and had accepted the deletion terms. I repeatedly explained that there was never a deletion process initiated by me. My account simply became inaccessible, and I followed the instructions Ancestry gave me when I contacted support. After weeks of trying to fix a problem I did not cause, I was essentially left with two choices: start over from scratch and purchase another DNA test, or walk away. I asked Ancestry if they could provide a replacement DNA test given the circumstances. Their response was no. I would have to purchase another one myself. Think about that for a moment: I paid for their memberships and DNA testing, used their service for years, followed their customer-service instructions when I lost access, and then ended up losing my account and DNA results. Their solution was for me to pay them again. The worst part is that I actually LIKED Ancestry. I had every intention of continuing to use it for years. But I cannot justify putting more time and money into a platform when I now know that years of work and valuable DNA results can apparently disappear, and customer service may simply tell you that the account is gone and cannot be recovered. This isn't just losing a password. This is losing years of personal family-history research and DNA information. I would strongly recommend thinking twice before investing years of work into this platform. If something goes wrong with your account, don't assume customer service will be able to fix it, because in my experience they couldn't.