FMP Community Guidelines

About these guidelines

Findmypast wants to encourage and support a positive, helpful and enjoyable conversation about our shared passion, genealogy, across all our digital presences.

These guidelines cover, but are not limited to, Findmypast’s websites, blog and presence on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter globally.

These guidelines are to help our customers, followers and employees understand the purpose of these channels, what constitutes acceptable behaviour and how they can help us handle any problems that may arise.

Your responsibilities

You are responsible for the posts and comments you make to our community. We encourage you to take part, to engage with people, to share your discoveries and to help your fellow community members.

We want people to feel welcome to our community. We encourage all community members to be generous with their knowledge and constructive with their feedback. Likewise, if you receive help from a community member, please do thank them for their time - there are people with a lot of expertise among our customers and staff, and many give their time and help for free.

We expect all community members to be civil and respectful to others at all times. Posts and comments that add value are encouraged.

Please do not share anyone else's confidential or private information. This includes their personal details such as address, phone number or email address. It can also include photographs of living people or financial information. You must have an individual's permission to share their personal information. Again, you are responsible for the information you share to our community.

What’s not allowed

We are a family history company, and therefore the focus of our channels is family history and genealogy. Off-topic posts will be deleted.

Advertisements, plugs for your business, social solicitations and other acts of self-promotion are considered spam and will be removed.

Coarse language, personal insults, gossip, comments or discussions that in our view are written intentionally to provoke, or posts that in our view cause or are likely to cause offence, will all be removed.

Repeat transgressors may be temporarily or permanently banned from Findmypast’s channels.

What’s unacceptable

Comments that degrade any race, ethnicity, religion, gender, sexual orientation, political orientation, age, or abilities are not acceptable. Such comments will be deleted.

Harassment of any community members or any Findmypast staff members will be treated extremely seriously.

Findmypast reserves the right to define what counts as degrading comments or harassing behaviour.

Transgressors may be temporarily or permanently banned from Findmypast’s channels, and may have their subscriptions cancelled and their access to Findmypast’s records removed.

Copyright

We understand the thrill of making a breakthrough and love to hear about your successes. Do attribute your information and give credit where it’s due.

Please do not use the Records to create your own work such as databases, articles, blogs or books, or copy or reproduce the Records, or publish them without our prior written permission.

Please do not post content that is protected by copyright or trademark without express permission from the owner. This includes pictures and historical documents posted by other members. Read more on Intellectual Property protection in our Terms & Conditions.

How moderation works

The following channels are monitored and moderated by Findmypast employees to allow us to respond to customer requests for help and to ensure a friendly, open and constructive conversation among our community:

However, it’s often the case that community members will spot problems before we do. If you see a post or comment that is in breach of these guidelines, we encourage you to contact us at community@findmypast.com. If you see something, say something.

Findmypast encourages all community members to engage positively with our community. Findmypast will decide what counts as breaches of community spirit and guidelines and will determine how to handle such cases.

Further help

For customer support and account queries, please contact Customer Support in your territory:

UK
US
Australia
Ireland

For genealogical help, do explore our blog and on-site help content.

We welcome your feedback on how our community is run and are always ready to hear suggestions to improve these guidelines. Please send your thoughts to community@findmypast.com.

Findmypast Forum rules

The Findmypast Forum is the official Facebook group for Findmypast: a place for all things Findmypast and family history, where beginners can seek advice, and more advanced researchers can share their tips and tricks.

By joining this group you accept the following rules:

Please don't invite others to the Forum: these will be deleted. Please encourage them to apply to join themselves
This Forum is not to be used by professional genealogists who are researching on behalf of a client. If you are a professional genealogist, you may use this Forum for your own research only.
Do not take a post or a photograph from someone in this Forum and post it elsewhere without their express permission
Please don't download and/or alter/colourise other members' photographs without their permission
Respect copyright of data holders - do not post images of online records or their transcriptions, but rather use the URL hyperlink (a small snippet for help with handwriting is acceptable)
Be respectful and polite
Please do not post GIFs or use coloured boxes
Please do not advertise (if in doubt please ask an Admin/Moderator), or private message any member to advertise your services (if you are messaged by someone who is offering their services, please contact a Moderator)
Please do not privately send other members images of records as this would be in contravention of our Terms and Conditions
Please respect the privacy of other members, including the Moderators, and do not send unsolicited private messages
Please don't post anything political

If a group member continually contravenes these rules they will be removed from the group. If you have any questions or concerns please write a post and tag Findmypast and the moderators, Chris Lang, Robyn Dally, Pat Allen and Catherine McEwan.

Note: If you have a question or query about your Findmypast account or subscription, or feedback, please drop the friendly Findmypast customer support team an email. The Moderators of the Findmypast Forum are unable to assist with technical queries. support@findmypast.com