MyCanvas Reviews 

Ordered in November. Paid for expedited and they said I'd have it in days. When I didn't hear anything repeatedly called and sent emails. They never responded to anything. Eventually, their phone had a message saying to send them an email and they'd respond. They did not respond to emails. Finally a day before Christmas they sent an email apologizing for not responding for so long and that they had lots of problems. I immediately responded telling them to cancel. They said they had no idea where any of the jobs were and they could not cancel. They said there were only 2 of them working and they were overwhelmed. I replied again telling them to cancel again. Their next reply said they had 300 people printing books and they could find any individual books in the midst of their 300 employees. The prior email said they had only 2 people. Can you trust what they say? I replied again to cancel the job. What a mess.

I loved the ease of use of my canvas and I published several large books with them. The layouts and embellishments were wonderful. My Ancestry books turned out beautiful. And then the bottom fell out. I was in the middle of huge projects and could not get them done before the deadline of their new platform because they were so involved. Now I have NO way to finish my projects which have literally 1000s of hours of work on them. MyCanvas provided me PDF files of my projects for a large amount of money. And they assured me I would be able to edit them. But after months of research, I have found nothing that will allow me to edit them. No pdf editor works on such complex files and I can't get them converted to any other format because they are too large. I am so discouraged, I can't even describe my frustration. I have tried several sites to get them converted to DOCX, but they are too large. So, beware, when they say they are a proprietary software, believe them. The site says, "The site does not have the ability to download or save your project to a CD, flash drive, or .pdf. We are very sorry for the inconvenience; however MyCanvas saves the projects that you create on the site, these are always safe and available for your use." THIS IS A LIE. My 1000s of hours of work are gone and not available for use. So I finally tried to build a book with the new platform in order to start over, but the 6+ times I have tried, I get an error message that it cannot be done at this time. Try later. Now, I don't know what I am going to do. I suggest you use a different non-proprietary software to create your Ancestry books!!!!!!!!!!!

Does anyone know who the corporate officers of this company?

my internet searches says it only has ONE employee, the customer service rep?

Where is all of my work? Just gone like that! No response via phone or email. I feel so sad for all of these other customers who I can see have had the same thing happen to them. It's devastating!

I did receive a positive response today for an order placed on Dec 14th. It is replicated below to give others hope that their investment of time and subsequent album purchase - may have a silver lining. It seems the website change occurred during a peak period for the small company. I'll report back after I've received the album. Of note - I researched my Visa purchase history and I have not been charged to date.

" Both of your orders are currently in the production process. I apologize for the delay! We have been experiencing an extremely high volume of orders and production due to the change over of the site along with the holiday rush. Our teams are working overtime to get orders out as quickly as they can. We will send you an email as soon as the projects are completed and leaving our facility. Thank you so much for your patience! We do appreciate it!

You will find the pdf links in the shipping confirmation email that you will receive once your orders ship. They are pdf links that you can click open to download and save the pdf files. Again, We apologize for the delay. Thank you!"

I had to be off Ancestry and MyCanvas for a few months and finally got back to my projects on MyCanvas only to find all my hard work is GONE. I can't even begin to quantify how many hours I have put into building descendent projects, importing documents and photos, font changes, etc. I am so unhappy with this company. I have enough tech background to know that if they had any kind of GOOD programmers, they could have written code to protect the work already done. Their excuse about Adobe is just that - an excuse. If they really wanted to save work, they could have and still revamped the site. I don't know if I can trust my work with them again. This experience makes it clear that they do not understand the ramifications of thoughtless changes nor do they value their customers.

I still haven't received a response to my email nor have I received my books. I've given up being able to give as a Christmas gift, though my children know they're coming late. I just hope I receive them as I didn't photocopy the pages. My Canvas has done beautiful work in the past and I'm hopeful it'll be OK.

My book was late and I emailed in a week ago. I didn't hear anything for a while but then I finally did get a reply about the back up in their production and stuff about their customer service being a small company that is trying to email everyone. Which makes sense at least they answered me eventually. Still waiting on the book they should have posted on their site sooner that they were behind. I see these other comments. Did anyone ever get a response or their stuff? You only see the negative stuff but I'd like to know if anyone ever got a resolution. People never write about that part.

This is what I think of the new Mycanvas. I wrote and sent this to MyCanvas and Ancestry

Dear: Ms Margo Georgiadis

My Name is Charles Rudolph, I believe you and MyCanvas are working together as one company but I might need you help. I as a retired CEO of a large Printing Company I only want to talk to a person that can get things done.

I have been a long time customer of Ancestry and I enjoy using your program. I also liked being able to go to MyCanvas and creating books. I'm enclosing a copy of the text that I sent them.


Message to Mycanvas

I need an answer to my problem. I have been with you company for many years. I have created many books, some of them 250 pages. A lot of my family members also purchased these books. I have a 250 page book called Charles Steinmiller that I can no longer work on. This book go's back to my family to 1851. I have been working on this book for over a year. I could never create this book again. So my question is what are you going to do so I can finished this book.

I am 78 years old and I need to finish this book for my family. I understand the printing business as I was part of it for 58 years. I became CEO of a large printing company, I had 150 people working for me 7 days a week 24 hours a day. So I understand printing.

Will your new site let me continue with the book. If not then I expect you give me PDF's of the book so I can finish thru another company. I understand the reason you had to change the program because Flash app will no longer work. I texted you guys yesterday on this but no one answered yet. If I don't here from you people soon, I will call your CEO and Ancestry and tell them I will no longer use there Site.

No matter what I want PDF'S because I have no way of finishing this book without them.

Charles Rudolph



If you talked to them you will see how may books I did and also the amount of work that I did in making these books. Since I understand printing more the most anyone.

I work myself from the bottom to CEO over 58 years, the books I do are not like anyone else.

I need to finish this book so my family will know were they came from on the Steinmiller side of the family.

Thank you

I placed an order for 2 Family history books to be delivered to family members for xmas. I ordered them 3 weeks in advance and have yet to recieve a confirmation that they were completed or in the process of being delivered. Ive called and emailed the corporate office support and help line numerous times with no response. Its now 3 days before xmas and my gifts are obviously not going to arrive on time nor am I certain they will arrive at all.

Omg where has my project gone? I've been working on it for so long and put so much work in. Has it gone forever? I want to cry. Please tell me you will revert back to the old system. Has it been saved???

I am happy I found Mycanvas and to have my books professionally printed. So many features and the ability to import data from Ancestry was awesome. But I had to hurriedly finish my books, because I had to meet the deadline. Wasn't ready to publish but was going to lose everything I had created in MyCanvas. It would be GONE FOREVER unless I purchased the books and got the .pdf files. These family history books are very expensive (though professionally printed), but I wrote them for my four grandchildren. It's been my life long work, and I couldn't lose what I had written for them. It was even hard to put many years in 250 pages, but I finally did. I had to purchase the books for each of them. Still waiting on one more book that I wrote. I don't like the new Mycanvas. Will go elsewhere to write my next story.

Please go back to the same format. You pull everything from Ancestry all the way down to a damn telephone book ad. There is no way to design anything. It is a useless piece of crap. I was working on a book for 2 years was a couple days from finishing and its gone. Don't tell me you couldn't say the work. We are in the 21st century, yet you took us back to "Pong" days. The screens look like they were made on an Etch Sketch.

You BLEW It! MyCanvas is nothing less than an "Stone Age" relic!!
If anyone has stock in this company, you better sell and sell quick. This company is heading to bankruptcy for sure.... You'd be an idiot to load up stuff work for years and then they just toss it out!

The Covid didn't do this, your IT Designers did this.

****UPDATE: I have an order that was "sent" before Christmas (already very late) and shipping was expedited. Over $1,000 charged already. It never arrived and the company will not respond to emails, even though the tracking number they sent was not correct. No calls accepted by the company. I would write Margo, the CEO of Ancestry because they are not only suggesting the use of MyCanvas, they have a direct link to the MyCanvas site. They don't seem to want to take responsibility for their part in this disastrous merger. I would also file an online report with the Better Business Bureau. This is not just a normal project, this is a project that, in most cases took months or years to put together with personal/private information and photos. We were all rushed with the threat of our treasured projects being lost forever and forced into an immediate, pricey purchase in order to have a pdf. The transition to a merger/buyout has been happening for months and this is not acceptable. This is attached to a company (ancestry.com) that keeps your DNA and other information. It's an uneasy feeling.

Original: After weeks of rushing a project because the company was getting rid of Flash (it took years to build), I finished in time and ordered several family books. This was over two months ago. I have heard the company was bought by someone other than Alexander's, although Alexander's will continue to print their books. This merge seems like it's a disaster and the company is unavailable for phone calls. Emails are returned with a "sorry" and they say printing machines keep breaking down. I think the CEO is overwhelmed. The customer service is the worst I have ever experienced. I have several books that are not going to make it by Christmas even though they were ordered in plenty of time. I wonder if they will ever be printed. At this point I think filing with the BBB and also contacting Ancestry are the only options.
UPDATE: I contacted the CEO of Ancestry and was told they don't own the company, so in not so many words, I'm Shoot out of luck. But it will be looked into since they deal with the company. I am thinking that won't happen unless more of us report this to Ancestry. They should be accountable, too.
ADDITIONAL UPDATE: One of my projects was finally sent. Awaiting the rest.
****UPDATE: I have an order that was "sent" before Christmas and expedited. Over $1,000 charged already. It never arrived and the company will not respond to emails. No calls accepted. I would write Margo, the CEO of Ancestry because they are not only suggesting Mycanvas, the company is directly linked to their site. I would also file an online report to the Better Business Bureau. This is not just a normal project, this is a project with personal/private information. Not acceptable. The transition to a merger or buyout has been happening for months and this is not acceptable.

Update: my family history books finally arrived five weeks after I ordered. I will say they look great! Now I can send these Christmas gifts off (better late than never). For some reason I did not receive an email with the pdf file so unfortunately I will have to follow up with
Customer service.

Same experience as others. I ordered books and posters in November with expedited shipping. The books have not arrived. You can’t call as they are not answering phone and the recording directs you to email. They do not respond to emails. I have no idea when, if ever, I will receive my order. At this point I just want to confirm they are working on my order and when it might arrive. I have given up on it arriving in time for me to send as Christmas gifts. Worst customer service I have ever encountered.

What happened to this company? Only 3 reviews are positive? And the last one was in June 2020?!?! I have to ditto all the negative comments. I am so disappointed, but not nearly as disappointed as those who were to get a book for Christmas.

I can’t echo what other people have said enough. Like so many, I was forced to rush my family history project so that my book was completed in time for a very tight deadline to be reached when MyCanvas suddenly announced they were dispensing with their site. I spent months completing the book using MyCanvas and finally completed and ordered it about 4 weeks ago. I heard nothing from them at all after placing my order and it went way beyond the time frame it takes them to ship a book according to their website. I complained repeatedly and was told that they were busy and I had to wait (it was worded more politely than this but that was the feel). I was repeatedly told it would be despatched imminently as it was almost ready and they were working around the clock to do so. Almost two weeks on from being told that there is no sign of my book. I have tried calling but it just tells you to send an email. I email but am now getting no response. I can honestly say that the way My Canvas treats its customers is appalling and have never known a company like it. To not even bother replying to perfectly reasonable emails from customers whose product is long overdue is about as bad as it gets. It looks like it’s months and months work down the drain and is going to be a very disappointing for Christmas for the person who I wrote the book for.

If I get no response today Im planning to get in touch with Ancestry to tell them of my experience and the contempt with which My Canvas treats its customers. If they don’t listen I will stop using ancestry also and go to another site who treat their customers well and listen to their concerns.

I’m also considering taking legal action against My Canvas for all the time that looks like it has been wasted. Has anyone else considered doing this?

I would also give a zero if it was an option. It doesn't import data from ancestry website properly, there is a character limit which doesn't show and they don't tell you about. Half my information is cut mid word, can't possibly give this as a present, only fit for the bin. No response from customer services apart from an email saying how did our customer services rate, even though they haven't actually answered me yet. Can't see me getting my money back after reading others comments.

I have to give My Canvas one star on your system but it deserves none. My poster arrived damaged. In addition I received an unexpected additional bill from FedEx for and Advancement Fee and Import Duty. All emails of complaint to My Canvas go unacknowledged and unanswered. Don't use My Canvas

Do not use MyCanvas. I have spent 18 months creating my family history book, for my brothers big birthday in a couple of months. It is very over-due on delivery - they do not reply to emails and I have called twice at a cost of 10p per second and each time it goes to answer message saying they are very busy. If they are busy its understandable but not responding to customers is despicable service. I have come round to the fact that I will not receive it, so I have started again with a local company. I have also called Ancestry - as this was the only reason I used MyCanvas. Ancestry do not care one bit, so also wont be using them again. How can you partner with someone and then take no responsibility whatsover when a problem occurs. MyCanvas also have over $200 of my money - absolutely disgusting.