MyHeritageReviews 6,486

In June 2015 I opted for a $6.90/month subscription. The commitment was for 5 years, and I would be charged annually. To my surprise I was charged for $413.72 on 06/03/2015, instead of $82.75. After loud but tedious complaining they refunded most of the 4 year charges. As it turned out they still overcharged me by almost 10 dollars ($91.92) instead of the promised $82.75.
Surprise, surprise. I just checked my June 2016 credit card statement and MyHeritage.com charged me a whopping $175.12 (instead of $73.58 = $82.75 minus last year's overcharge of $9.17) on 06/03/2016. In the $175.12 MyHeritage included all types of extra features that I don't need, but more importantly I DID NOT ASK FOR or AGREE TO!

In summary:
MyHeritage.com advertises $6.90/month billed annually for 5 years. After complaints it becomes:
- first year, they tweaked it up to $7.66/month, and
- second year, they more than doubled the price to $14.59/month!

I just contacted my credit company and they put a block on MyHeritage.com for the next 4 years.

I had hoped they cleaned up their act after my complaint of June 2015. I can't anything else than conclude: MyHeritage.com has stepped up their unethical business practices.

I will further inform this forum how MyHeritage.com is responding to my second upcoming complaint.

Entering into a fourteen day free trial it quickly became apparent that the site could not provide what I needed. I received notification that they had charged me £90.
When I contacted them to explain I would not be using the service I was told a refund was not possible. First I was offered a 25% refund with a lengthy explanation of how I was not using the site correctly. I patiently allowed the representative, Samuel, to patronise me for some time but insisted that I was not willing to pay for a service which I did not need and would not use under any circumstances. He then offered a 50% refund. I repeated that I was not interested and requested a full refund. He said this was not possible and that the refunds offered were something he had never done before and were exceptional. Eventually I lost patience with the hard sell and informed him that I did not have the funds available to pay and that if they persisted in removing money from my bank account I would be overdrawn and penalised by the bank.
At this point, despite his previous position, he said a full refund would be issued.
I have received an email from myheritage.com confirming a refund of £90.
I have yet to see the funds deposited into my account.
Moral of story: If you have the misfortune to become entangled with this unpleasant company do not be swayed by their insistence on payment, do not believe the lying representative, stick to your guns. Better still, do not sign up in the first place.
Update: Refund received by Paypal.

I've used about three different record searching sites including Ancestry which is amazing, well-priced and always lets you know before they charge anything. I made a free-trial account with my heritage which I realize sucked from day one and CANCELLED my subscription the day of starting it. Get an email today that I've been charged almost 120 dollars. Call them and they say "Hey we can meet you in the middle and refund half" even though it was an error on their part. I now lost 60 dollars for their mistake at a time where I could really use the money. Disgustingly run.

DO NOT USE THIS SITE. They are happy to take out a number of costs as renewal time without telling customers that there are multiple fees. When I complained I got the basic too bad email and am unable to have a refund made to my now overdrawn account because of this. NEver, ever trust this money hungry, uncustomer driven company. We have laws in place to protect consumers from this type of shady behaviour and I will be taking this further.

I tried to contact this "Dean" as he requested, however I got a reply from someone different with the exact same respone. I am told this company on a number of occasions I do not want this and they are refusing to cancel it and refund my monies. DO NOT TRUST THIS COMPANY IN ANY WAY UNLESS YOU ARE PREPARED TO PAY THEM FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE.

I am still trying to get my money back without any success.

I have finally had some success. They have sent me an email refunding my monies and also giving me a free years subscription to the site (i have noted the end date) to amke up for the frustration that was caused. I am waiting fior thr refund to go back into my account.

Hi all first of all DO NOT GET THIS! I first researched divorce records and it said there was 14 in my search so i tried a 14 day trail on the 16th of June to be exact i never could find anything I was looking for so i cancelled the subscription then they said no refund! I flipped they offered me 25% back i was so pissed I said fine and expect the worst review! And hung up, they called me back and offered 50% back! I said fine they kept trying to tell me why and to be honest didn't want to listen to them! In my calculations from the 16th of june to the 30 of june is the free trial period
THEY SHOULD OF SENT A MESSAGE TELLING ME ITS ABOUT TO EXPIRE i HAVE TRIPLE CHECKED MY EMAILS AND NEVER DID THEY SEND A MESSAGE i AM SO DISAPPOINTED WITH THIS SITE THEY SHOULD OFFER A FULL REFUND MINUS WHAT TIME I DID USE
THAT WAS$ 9.99 I BELIEVE FOR 14 DAYS THIS SITE IS A RIp OFF DO NOT USE THIS SITE!
They are not clear on the trial and as they didn't send a email telling me my trial was over this is sneaky and totally unfair

I do not remember seeing anything about charges after the 14 day trial. And now I am charged on my Visa 75.00 U.S. Do you know how that translates into Canadian $.? This whole routine is nothing but a rip off, under the Free Trial I looked up one name, have not looked at the site again and don't intend to. I would like a refund to my account. When I saw their email to me stating the charges I could not even remember who my heritage was. Please, I am an OAP and cannot afford this kind of charge.
L. Frost

I signed up for an account and got the app because it said it was free and had exclusive records. I was just hoping to supplement the extensive research my family has already done. I put in my information, and my parents and grandparents' information. I was shown 50+ family matches to approve. It showed me records added by my own brother on Wikitree, which is free, and then wouldn't let me view anything else without paying for a membership! Anyone who pays to use this is crazy because it is stealing free records and charging you to see them! An absolute SCAM!

Dont join for your sake! Scam be aware!
I am disgusted of my heritage. It's outrageous, specially because making so hard to cancel an online service by demanding a phone call from accounts that never happens by all means it is dishonesty and dishonour of the regulations.

Like many others I am a victim of 14 day trial. On the 14 day I was charged $$$$$. I need the money back and it was out of my budget.

On the 14 day after few hours I phoned and emailed to refund my money. I wanted only free trial. In their regulation is written that it is 30 day refund if you are not happy with the services. I was charged for a year and when I called the woman said if I cancel my account they would not have to give me any refund, so her advice was that I must wait a miracle for the customer services call me back to proceed with my request. This is not reasonable since she said the customer services and accounts departments are in different parts of the globe, apparently in Israel and I am in Australia so when should I receive a call? I am willing to wait overnight and anytime. It's a rip off and unfair, very bad service and I don't wish it for my worst enemy. They even not honour their policy of refund! If they want charge me for 14 days okay, even though was supposed to be a free trial but not for an year NO, I don't admit this abuse!

I am deeply disappointed and also disgusted of this dishonourable behaviour.

I joined because of the book matching feature, which is described in their blog. I have over 20,000 people in my tree. I expected book matching to generate 1000s of finds--it generated ONE! Yet, when I search books for an individual name, many finds are generated. I have had no success with customer support, either by phone or email. Dean sent me two email messages which suggested I "read the blog" (duh! That's why I joined), and then pointed to the ONE match I already had and unhelpfully informed me that "a book match will appear within your record matches." Yes, I KNOW that! Two tech support people couldn't do anything but "escalate" me... thy had no faint idea what the problem was... and no one called me back. I notice that lots of "Smart Matches" (84,505) have been generated for my tree. BUT I don't care about them at all. I don't want other people's trees. I want the BOOKS. This failure is a big disappointment, and Customer Support appears to be virtually nonexistent. I tried to leave a comment/complaint on their blog and also on their FaceBook page--but they were not permitted. All this company wants to hear are "Awesome..." I thought Ancestry had lousy customer support, but compared to my Heritage they are terrific. At least they permit customers to place critical comments on their blogs and they also allow problems to be reported--and often responded to--on their FaceBook page. When I called today, no manager was available to speak to me and all the rep could do was say my problem had been "escalated" and "someone will call you"--but she had no clue when anything would happen. I think book matching would be brilliant--but it doesn't work for me, and no one at myHeritage seems to know anything helpful.

I am very happy with MyHeritage, I have found more family members than I expected. There is only one problem: Many members approve Smart Matches to easily! E.g. My brother and father (same name) and grandfather (similar name) have been indiscriminately Smart Matched so that the facts, photos, and dates are all mixed up. Maybe two people agreeing on a match is not enough?

A special thank you to Judith from Support who helped me (with endless patience) to untangle a problem caused by myself. I really did not think it would be possible!

Louie Mostert

I signed up for a 7 day trial. On the 8th day (I know, it was my mistake thinking I signed up for it on Monday, but it was actually Sunday) I was charged 89.99. I called for a refund and the woman who answered the phone refused to issue me a refund. She kept saying "according to the terms you agreed to", making it sound like it was some sort of trap.

I told her that, nowhere in the terms that I agreed to, did it say that they will never issue a refund. I understand that my account is automatically billed after 7 days, that IS in the terms, but not issuing refunds isn't, especially when it's only a day after.

When I told her this, all she could say is "that's how trials work". I kept telling her I understand that, but they still never said at any point that they have a no refund policy.

She finally said "why didn't you just cancel it within the 7 days?".

At that point I asked to speak to her supervisor, and she said "I'm actually the account manager".

I'm terribly upset with the way they treat their customers. The sad thing is, I think they have a great product and would be interested in joining in the future, I just can't afford it right now. But if they treat their customers this way, I would be hesitant to ever join them.

I didn't find what I was looking for in the website, so I read the refund policy and requested a refund politely. Spoke with a person, maybe his name was Warren. He was rude and very hesitant to give me a refund. I was polite and spend eight days trying to contact the company, with no replies. Finally I received a voicemail stating that they had tried to contact me, but left no number to contact back with. I didn't receive that phone call, as it was during the middle of the day during work, where I receive no cell service. Finally got ahold of the same man, who was very defensive. I had nothing wrong with the company until they showed their poor customer service. I was told I would receive the refund, and when I asked for the man's name for my records, which is my right, he was offended and rude to me. It was nothing personal, I just wanted to assure I received my money back. Use the website all you want, but do NOT invest in the premium packages! They are a rip off and not worth your money, which you might or might not get back!

I am disgusted of my heritage. Probably I will never use it again, because I abhor it. All bad what they write is true! BEWARE!

Like many others I am victim of 14 day trial. On 14 day I was charged with 146 $. I am from poor country and it was one third of my salary. If I had not have savings from weeding I would not have money for basic needs - also for food and I would be forced to beg for help to not die of starvation.

On 15 day I phoned them to refund my money. I wanted only free trial. In their regulation is written that it is 30 day refund. On the phone they said that this doesnt apply to free trial despite nothing like this is wrritten in regulations. This is unfair, very unfair. They even not honour their regularions.

They said that they could refund me 50% price + full VAT (26$) so: 86$. I have agreed because I have no choice. Week later they send me 73$, not 86$. So they even honour their words and promises. I am deeply disappointed and also disgusted of this dishonourable behaviour.