Genealogy Chat

I have never paid an annual subscription of more than just over £7; I paid £6 per year in the last two renewals. I have stated to GR that it is unlikely that I shall renew next year if such an exorbitant increase is demanded of me.

I do not use the records, as I subscribed to ancestry long before genes reunited put historical records into its site, and I use the many free sites available to the public; and I removed my tree from the site during one of its instabilities.

I have enjoyed putting up tips of information and helping people.

Perhaps GR think that if they increase the fees then the people who are happy to help at the moment (without using the GR facilities) will not re-new their memberships. That way GR can make more profits by selling credits to view "their" records.

Like many of you I only have a small part of my tree on here and don't get many relevant "hot matches".

I do enjoy reading the boards and helping where I can but in the last couple of years the activity on the boards has greatly decreased and as already been said there seems to be more helpers than requests for help.

I wondered that Ann

My auto renew is off as I prefer to pay when my subs run out....normally a few minutes after midnight.

I will not be renewing in Feb at the new price, not because I cannot afford it, but as I only use the site to help others it is not worth it

So, if we have continuous membership, which means that they can automatically take our subs, does that mean we will automatically get the discount for prompt payment? Has anyone clarified that?

Thank you, Elizabeth. I was actually answering Jax's post on page 1 without realising that the thread had reached page 3!!

My mistake - a senior moment??

Andysmum

Below is the post from Estelle yesterday-you will see that the standard annual sub is £19.95 and with 20% discount if you renew before due date which gives the £15.95.

The 6 months option at £9..... is a discount on the actual price for 6 months of £14.95

So........I (think) we are all going to be paying approx £20.00 pa -with a discount for prompt payment ?

Report 20 Dec 2012 16:20

Hi everyone,

as Rachel has already said in her email, we are slowly moving everyone over to the same renewal price. For those of you on a standard subscription, this is £14.95 for 6 months and £19.95 for 12 months. If you renew before the renewal date then there is a 20% discount on the cost of your renewal. Elizabeth - this is why your is £15.96, as that's the annual price less a 20% discount.

As normally happens, we will email you before your renewal date to confirm the cost of it.

If you do have any further questions then please contact our customer support team.

Kind regards,

Estelle :-| :-|

I think it is anyone who has been paying since the year dot to around 2006 was on the cheap rate....... 2007-2010ish £9.95 every six months and anyone joining after that was paying full price of £15 for six months or £20 yearly.....could be wrong though!!

Thanks for confirming my suspicions Roy.
Why should we "oldies" pay nearly twice as much for info that we can´t access??
What´s more, if we wanted to access all the info on Genes, we would have upgraded long ago.
The fact that it´s quite often the "oldies" who do lookups for members will impact on the performance of the site if many of us refuse to pay the new price. Not that Genes is famous for it´s faultless performance.
Also, have never been able to understand Genes pricing policy for standard membership. What exactly constitutes a longstanding member.....5 years?3 years?

Jax, you don't need a tree to use Keepsafe. It is simply an on-line storage cache for photos etc. and if you make them private and label them with fairly vague descriptions eg John's wedding, then you are unlikely to get people contacting you.

The advantage is that you no longer use up computer space for photographs and they don't get lost if your computer crashes. (I know, they can be put on CD).

Re subscriptions, if the annual rate is £15.96, will I get a reduction as I currently pay £9.95 for 6 months??

wisechild, My understanding is that you are correct, GR have decided to increase the price in line with what new members pay so that everyone pays the same

That's loyalty for you

Roy

I hesitate to ask, but are ALL membership fees being increased by the same percentage, or is it just the old, loyal, longstanding members who have been selected for the favour?

Wow... That's a huge increase and more than triples what I have paid for the year, in the past.
Will Genes team provide a service of help and lookups if their stalwart team of helpers on here abandon ship?

Gwyn

Thanks to everyone who has added to my thread - I now feel a bit mean about highlighting this problem so close to the festive season and hope that I've not spoilt anyone's Christmas!

I was interested to see that today GR seem to have changed their section on Subscription Renewals on the FAQs page - no mention now of long-term members being able to renew at the same price. (See Ray's - aka Porky Pie - post on the first page of this thread for the originial text.)

I have just replied to GR, mainly pointing out the breach in their Terms & Conditions (perhaps that will change shortly too!) and requesting that my membership be renewed at the original £9.95.

Will let you know the outcome!

Penny

Thanks for the clarification Jax.
I was a bit confuzzled by it all.
I had no idea that this was happening.
I may not be renewing mine again in June 2013 after all.

Anne

This site never learns !!

Once again it has taken a member to make others aware of the price changes.

Why GR can not be upfront about the prices and display them clearly on the boards.

Anne

You may have just paid £7.95 for 6 months but in 6 months time you will be paying £14.95 for 6 months before any discount....you will not be able to change it to annual subscription to make it cheaper...(.as far as I know)....That £7.95 was a one time or this year discount of 20% normal price £9.95 for 6 months

Mine has always been paid annually. Just checked and I have an annual membership until December 2013. I have been a continuous member since 2003.

I think some of us may need to look at our Subscription Details info and check when the sub expires.

I have been a member since 2008 and have always had a basic sub automatically paid on 6 monthly basis
It was automatically renewed on 15th Dec ( 5days ago) and cost £7.95.
This equates to £15.90 per annum

I'm absolutely disgusted!

I keep a small tree here and I read the boards and sometimes add to them. I don't subscribe to the records, blogs, keepsafe etc... nor do I want to.

I joined when the site was Genes Connected and have been a member ever since.

My subscription as a standard member was renewed at the beginning of this month for £7.96 (I'm a very old member and pay by the continuous member method)

I seem to be 'safe' for a year but will think very seriously at the end of November next year when renewal comes around.

If this site worked properly, which it very rarely does, I wouldn't mind so much but I really think this is all about profit for BrightSolid. They are doing things behind members backs which is disgraceful!

Viv in Herts

I think we can say. Happy Christmas GR. :-)