Some Australian FHCs not connecting to Portal sites
A number of Australian FHCs have contacted support in the last week because they have suddenly lost access to the Portal premium sites. We have done all the usual remedial actions, from restarting the building router, ensuring the Portal extensions are installed correctly, and so forth. All computers connect to the building internet in the usual way, it is just the Portal extension which doesn't recognise that the computer is in the FHC.
Has anyone had similar problems? Or more importantly, does anyone have a solution that we can provide to our FHCs?
Answers
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Hello Norm
I have reported your issue back to the Managers in Utah and are awaiting their response. However, could you tell me the names of the Wards where you are located, where the outage is being experienced?
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There are three official reports of outages:
Karawatha FHC 408700
Newcastle FHC 407712
Southern River FHC 408034.
There may be an unknown number of others who haven't made official reports yet. Not everyone has adjusted to the new ways of reporting issues and getting help.
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I am having the same problem at Marion FHC in South Australia. Unit 407682. I am fairly new in this calling and wonder if you could also tell me the correct procedure for contacting support and making official reports when these issues arise. My stake tech specialist wasn't able to help me.
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With the cessation of telephone support, you now have the option of sending an email to Pacific Support, or booking an online meeting with a support person. To find these options, you click on the question mark inside a circle, which is located at the top right of your browser window when you are signed into FamilySearch. This will bring up the following box: select the Contact Us option.
In the next screen, select the Australia region, then scroll down to find the email option, or at the bottom of the page, the schedule a meeting option:
I have added your FHC to the list of centres requiring assistance and will let you know when a solution is available.
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Thank you Norm. I have not used this community before, and, after a quick browsing session, am happy to know how helpful it could be. I also need to rely on others for technical expertise, so wonder if I would be wasting support staff time by contacting them personally. It might be best if I ask someone better qualified to follow technical advice to make contact.
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You would never be wasting our time. We are happy to step you through processes and some can even be done remotely. Don’t hesitate to get in contact if things don’t look right.
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Thank you again. I might do that when I am in the FHC again next Wednesday.
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Hello Norm,
Portal is operational in Southern River 408034 this morning. All good, thanks.
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Hello Norm,
Please add to the list who can't access familysearch.bdm.nsw.gov.au at LIsmore, New South Wales, Unit 408387. The Lismore ward FHC computers cannot access New South Wales BDM. Nor can the laptops of anyone who brings their own computer into the FHC. Queensland and Victoria BDM access work fine. Just not New South Wales. I can access NSW BDM at home, but not at the FHC. Difficult to explain to non-members and members why something so fundamental as births, deaths and marriages information can't be accessed. I have reported this to the Sydney technical person with no solution
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bdm.nsw.gov.au does not require portal access, it just needs access to the internet. If it you are actually using the URL which you provided, that is the problem, as it does not require "familysearch" at the beginning.
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Tonight I have the official word from our Area TFH consultant, it just needs a code to rectify the problem. please contact your Stake Tech Specialist for help if you are in Victoria and Tasmania. Not sure of the issues in the other states of Australia.
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Nelson FHC in New Zealand reporting portal issues today: All 3 of the computers at the Nelson FHC cannot access the FHC portal sites. Yesterday it said that we had been blocked and today it says 'well this is unexpected', then gives options of what to do. Reload the page doesn't work.
Any quick fix for this please. They are all connected to the firewall.
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Hi Norm,
Yes, I tried to go through the regular site of the BDM for NSW but once again I'm not allowed access. I did a Windows Network Diagnostics and it told me that the DNS server isn't responding
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That is very strange - I just tried from home with no problems. Do you have a ward or stake tech specialist who could have a look?
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It's only when I try using the bdm.nsw.gov.au site at the chapel, I can access it from home too
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I haven't had any help from the ward or stake tech specialist, but I' just have to keep hounding them
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There has been a recent "Global" outage of the functioning of the Portal Extension and also a fault with the FamilySearch connection to ancestryinstitution. There are reports that the Portal is working again in the Chrome Browser, in the UK but the latter fault seems to be continuing.
This is not a local issue, it is on the server side of our systems.
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FamilySearch is aware of the issue and their software engineers are working on a software update that they hope will be ready in a few weeks.
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Thankyou David, good to know
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