Genealogy Chat

Ken, I agree, this past year I have found numerous transcription errors and have been submitting reports at the rate of at least two a month. They are usually rectified and responded to within a couple of weeks.

I also find many errors, especially age ones, are caused because the enumerator, or his superior, has managed to partly obliterate the details with their collating marks.

Before members are too critical, remember that hindsight is a wonderful thing. Most errors are obvious when you what the answer should be....!

While on the subject of mistranscriptions, don't forget age errors. Thanks to an extra mark added to the return on of my relative's age was transcribed as 60 instead if 30. Having all those children while in her fifties would have been quite a feat.

Having said that I have found Ancestry to be very good at correcting transcription errors and they do send you a nice email which makes you feel it's worth bothering.

I think it is better to have poor transcriptions than none at all.

As mentioned, the main problem is transcribers who have little knowledge of Great Britain, geographically, or names or people or towns etc etc.
This is probably because the records are sent to India to be transcribed :-S and there we have it!!

I send Ancestry no end of error messages/amendments, whether it's anything to do with my own family or not, because when searching through, if I see a mistake which is glaringly obvious it bugs me to bits, so I can't let it go!!!!


As for the wrong census image coming up, yes, I've come across a few now, and reported them but they are yet to be rectified. :-0


K

No, it´s not you Kathleen.
If I have time, I send an amendment, even if it´s not my family, but the amendments don´t appear for ages.
Have found some real corkers in my time.
Think a lot of the transcribing was done abroad by non English speakers & of course they would have no knowledge of geography either.

Is it me......When you see a "strange" spelling of a name, ie Brishup, instead of the correct, Bishop...and you look at the actual census sheet, it is sooooo obviously BISHOP....do they use dislectic transcribers?

About a year ago I reported that a whole barracks full of army personnel in Birmingham had been given the surname Private.
As far as I know, nothing has changed.

be very careful with Ancestry . The have my gradparents buried separately, both in wrong sections wrong dates and in a cemetry some 60 - 70 miles from where they are actually buried (in double grave same section and with correct dates).Historical Society who supplied info has alerted them to their muck-up regarding these two cemeteries and goodness knows how many others. Nothing has been done to date. Also they need to take more care with names and the deciphering thereof :-(

I had a look a couple of weeks ago and could see that they had made a mess of several of the districts in the 30-40 range. In particular the descriptions of two or three of the districts were obviously wrong in that they were not district descriptions. I did send a wrong image report for two of them.

Some months ago I told them that there were, in the 1861 census, a few hundred mistranscription that give the place of birth of St Peter Port residents as St Peter Port, Germany. I don't think they have been corrected yet.

if it helps i have also click the Report Image Problem button for you

shelly xx

Thanks for the update. At least that explains things.

Sorry about delay in replying but husband not been well.
I finaly spoke to Ancestry and they say that as its a whole batch which has been wrongly transcribed it is in a queue to be rectified. They say I am the only one complaining about this batch and until someone else or even several people complain it has to wait in a queue as they have the whole world and have to prioritise each wrong image.
So it looks like I will be waiting maybe another four years!
Thank you for all your replies.
Linda :-0

Hard to believe that you've been sending emails once a month for 4 years and getting replies! Why haven't you said what was in the replies?

I don't really understand. If you have a file of emails what is it they have said in them?

I find that when I report an error (and I have done several dozens) they usually sort it out pretty pronto.

Have you tried Find My past, sometimes they will have what ancestry doesnt?

Hello Inspector Green Pen,

I have done this monthy since 2007 and got nowhere. I have a file of correspondence from them via email.
Got fed up with this so will now phone them.
Linda

Hello Jonesey,
Thank you for the phone number I will get onto this straight away.
Regards Linda

Why don't you use the Census error reporting system?

Click View Record, then click on Report Image Problem and select Wrong Image

Ancestry telephone number is 0800 404 9723

That will take you to their offices in Utah, USA but it is toll free so it doesn't cost you anything. I have spoken to them there several times and always found them most helpful. They deal with UK Ancestry problems

Hello everyone,

Does anyone have the same problem as me on Ancestry. I have been trying to get Ancestry to rectify a batch of wrong images since 2007. Its a batch for Newington District Hull Yorkshire. I want to see the original census for 1901 for my great grandmother Sarah J Nelson. Born 1861 in Hull. With her are Charley b.1883, Edward b.1885, William b. 1887 (my grandfather) Rebecca b 1892, John b. 1894 and Thomas b. 1896. They lived in Hessle Ave, Gillett Street Hull.
Ref RG13/4479 page 37. When I try to look at the correct image I get RG13/4483 this is for Beaumont Street Hull.
I have emailed Ancestry monthly since 2007 and still the wrong image comes up.
I am at my witts end! All the other images I look up are correct.
I never get anywhere with this.
Does anyone have a phone number for this country I could try please?
Any help appreciated.
Thank you.
Regards Linda