HopeChest email

[kaybee123@embarqmail.com]

I received an email from a Company called HopeChest that says for a fee it can work in conjunction with family search.org. There’s no address for this company and I’m concerned how they even got my email to advertise to me about my family search account. Anyone else get one also?

[russellhltn]

It's a known name, but when I look on the FamilySearch site, I'm not seeing it as a partner. Perhaps I'm looking in the wrong place.

[davesudweeks]

I have used Hope Chest a lot. It is a Chrome Browser extension so only works on Chrome. I am not affiliated with the company other than as a user of the software. It doesn't "scrape" names for temple work like some other products promise, but identifies ancestors who might be ready for temple work. I purchased the pro version when it first came out but the product is now under new ownership who have changed it to an annual subscription model (which I won't do) so I'm back on the limited free version. The free version is fully functional for basic searches, but some features (like saving search results in folders) are turned off - there is a compare page on their web site that shows what each version includes.

I do like it, though, as it helped me find some breakthrough's in my cousin lines. It doesn't do anything you can't already do in FamilySearch, but does help you quickly gather a list of ancestors ready for research rather than combing through ancestral lines one at a time. I went back to ancestors in the early 1800s and searched descendants. It searches through all the siblings so helped me identify lots of cousin lines that had tons of available sources and opportunities for research.

Here is their Chrome Web Store page: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/deta ... eljkhpblhp
This is their website: https://hopechestsoftware.com/Index.html

[kaybee123@embarqmail.com]

I appreciate the information. My concern and what I’d like to know is how they got my email address to advertise to me? From the church? (I doubt it) From inappropriate use of lds tools, familysearch, etc? There’s no information of who this company is or who owns it. It doesn’t seem right.

[russellhltn]

You're not likely to find out exactly how they got your email. I agree the website's lack of contact information doesn't instill confidence.

[davesudweeks]

You're not likely to find out exactly how they got your email. I agree the website's lack of contact information doesn't instill confidence.

I agree that having a physical address would be better. I think the original programmer was just an individual working on his own time but when he was called as a bishop, he couldn't devote the time needed to keep it up (I received an email from him as a registered owner of the app and he said as much) so he sold it to someone else he trusted to move it forward. It's also possible the new owner is also an individual coding/maintaining it on their own time so any address may be their home...

If I had questions, I would probably send an email to the email address listed on the web page.

[bishop246]

I used Hope Chest heavily for many years, primarily to use the descendancy searches for new ordinances. It used to work great. Over the last year it has not worked well at all. It freezes during searches, loops back on the same search instead of moving through the different children. I have emailed the company but the responses only tell me to uninstall and reinstall the Chrome Extension. In fairness, I did switch to an apple computer about a year ago, and it may be that it just doesn't work for the Apple Chrome. I did pay for the premium version as I wanted to support the company, but Hope Chest has been a big frustration over the last year.