General Chat

There´s no facility on Genes for amending your card details until your sub comes up for renewal.
Then theoretically. Genes send you an e mail telling you your card has expired (which of course you already know) & that you need to give them your new details within a certain time span, otherwise your membership will lapse & you will have to take out a new one.
I shall be in exactly this situation at the end of February.

Just the same happened to me last January 2013 Elizabeth!! I was on continous renewal too but my card had expired so they charged me the full £19.95........I'd been a member since 2008. They don't explain anywhere that that will happen and if I'd known I wouldn't have been on continous renewal!! :-S

Well, I just clicked to come off continuous renewal and up popped an offer of 20% off for loyal membership so it's £15.96 this time!! I still haven't found where you can update the card you are using if it expires though. :-S

Jax , your above email is exactly word for word the same as the one I received..

Probably if GR sent me my renewal for £7.96 I would just happily pay it but I would still think it was unjust. If everyone was paying the higher price I would be happy with that. Ideally everyone would be paying somewhere in the middle of the two.

I live in Tenerife and my sub renewal was in euros, the equivalent of £15.96, so I assume I do pay VAT.

When I complained that my half yearly sub had gone up to £15 less 20% £12 in the space of a week, I got this reply

Dear Jax

Thanks for your email.

I am sorry to hear you are unhappy with the price changes. Whilst we have increased the cost of our Standard subscription, there has been a significant decrease in the cost of our 6 month Platinum subscription by £15.00. You can also buy an annual subscription now. So, a standard subcription for one year costs just £19.95.

We do feel that our standard subscription still offers very good value for money. You now get unlimited access to our non-indexed birth, marriage and death records. We also plan to add more features to the standard subscription over the coming months.

I will pass your comments on to the Genes team though.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So I had to re-subscribe as a new member no discount at all

Why would I want unlimited access to non indexed BMD's when they are free on freebmd?

And NO I do not want platinum I have FMP and Ancestry WW

Also I have not noticed any new features in the last year

Margee ................

i joined the same month as you, and I'm also in Canada :-S

Well seeing as they want to charge me 4 times as much.....it is totally unfair.

We are only seeing replies from people who use the boards....wonder how many thousands who just use the tree and message sending have been given these big increases and accepted it??

This is what I renewed for in August 2013 ..............

also from an email I received.


We'll renew your subscription for £7.96 on 09 Aug 2013 using the most recent card you used to make a payment to us.



and that is also what the receipt says.


Of course, I am quite well aware that all the fuss being raised will result in higher subs for those of us who have been lucky enough to still fall under the grandfather clause that was used by a previous owner.

There is no doubt that I and others like me will be the big losers in the attempt to help those of you who have not been lucky.

GR is not likely to reduce your subscription to match the lower amounts paid .......... rather they will increase ours.

That means that many of US will not renew!

I don't think that it now is worth £15 or £20 a year for the basic sub


However, it is the fact that there is such inconsistency that is important.

I don't know why but I didn't question it. Would you? Although I benefit from it I don't think it's right to have such a great disparity in prices. Just a thought, could mine be less because I live in Canada and so am not charged VAT? Don't know, just a guess.

Who knows why, not GR that's for sure

So why is yours £6 when you joined in 2004?

I'm the one who paid 6 pounds for a year's renewal in May. In case you don't believe me or think it's something to do with conversion to dollars I've c&p'd this from the message from GR:

We'll renew your subscription for £6.00 on 21 May 2013 using the most recent card you used to make a payment to us.

That´s fine.
As long as everyone who has the same level of membership pays the same amount.

A previous thread about renewal...2008.

http://www.genesreunited.co.za/boards/board/general_chat/thread/1023156

Mr Magoo - I do not have a tree on here - do not buy vouchers - have FMP. The trouble is that GR play around with the asking fee. It is the inconsistency which is wrong and it does appear that admin is sadly lacking.

The extra week was when the site was unavailable for some reason for a length of time I think.

What I was saying Chris was, if they have you down (in error) as having a break, even though you know you didn't. the fees are computer generated so the computer thinks you had a break.

I pay the asking fee as you all do. I don't have a tree on here but it's useful for other info.

OOPs - another letter will be on its way to Alex as guess what?

On 27 December 2012 it was ALEX who informed me that my renewal date had been extendedby three weeks to 21 January 2013!

I originally I enrolled on 31 December 2003 now some years later the renewal date became due a week later - something is niggling me that there was a messup possibly with the site and some members got vouchers and others a weeks extension of payment.

Can anyone recall this?

Ann - I have never had a break since Dec 2003. I have asked now the same questions that I and others asked a year ago and the answers are different!

Last year reply was everyone was being brought slowly into line how slow is slow? Yesterday's reply from Alex is that I had a break - that my sub for 2012 was not paid until 2013.

Now the reason is that on 24 December 2012 I received notice that my subs were increasing twofold on 6 January 2012. I complained and around this time it came to light that others were paying different amounts.

Another member pointed out that this was against the rules when an increase applied so GR decided to give me an extension of another 3 weeks and my due date was 21 January 2013.

a) I am told that subs are increased
b) I am now told that my sub was not paid on time hence
break in continuous membership
c) I know this is incorrect so therefore should not have had
an increase!!

Work it out. I have unearthed some statements and going by what others have been saying there has before this debacle, a difference in subs.

Maybe the £6 is the conversion from dollars??

You are allowed a month before you renew for it not to affect any change in prices

Gosh £6 now, although a couple of years back i think I was charged £6 something.

Wendy, that is strange if you have never had a break it doesn't make sense. I do think you would regret it if you didn't renew though.