British Newspaper Library - Beware!!!

[Hackstaple]

Like so many of you I dipped my toes in the water and bought a one month trial  sub to the British Newspaper Library. I assumed that this was the result of the digitisation of the old Colindale Newspaper Library which had moved to Leeds (?) and announced that it would no longer make the hard copies available. It may or may not be that and when I accessed the site I found the journals so far were very limited but I found, surprisingly,  a reference to my grandfather in the Leicester Mercury. I had not even the slightest idea that he had ever been there.  When I tried to print this out I found you cannot select part of a page, a single article, and highlight it to print. You can only print the whole page [or double page]. Even on my A3 printer this resulted in miniscule type.

I read elsewhere this same complaint from others and emailed them to say this was a serious fault and that I would not continue. To my utter astonishment they have continued to debit my account through my debit card. I spoke to them today and they maintain that I signed up for a  continuous membership at £9.99 a month. I am taking action to see that they do not operate any future charges and have requested the return of the charges after the one month I agreed to.

[rosie99]

To my utter astonishment they have continued to debit my account through my debit card. I spoke to them today and they maintain that I signed up for a  continuous membership at £9.99 a month. 

It is the same as FindMyPast you need to untick the box for continuous payment
http://help-and-advice.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/knowledgebase/articles/348626-why-did-my-subscription-renew-automatically

[Alexander.]

The simplest method to print a single article is to use one or more screen shots of the article. You can paste these into a Word document for printing. The file downloads are in PDF format, which explains why you would not be able to print part of a page.

As for the auto-renew, this is done on most subscription sites now. When I subscribed a month to BNA it was quite clear that it would renew unless I unchecked the auto-renew box on my account page.

Alexander

[smudwhisk]

It is the same as FindMyPast you need to untick the box for continuous payment
http://help-and-advice.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk/knowledgebase/articles/348626-why-did-my-subscription-renew-automatically

And make sure you tick the update button at the bottom of the page or it won't save.

I've taken several BNA 1 month offers in recent months and have always ensured the tick was removed from auto-renew, you can remove it as soon as you subscribe, and I've never been auto-renewed.  In BNA's defence, when you take out a new subscription but have already removed the tick, it doesn't reappear, although I tend to click update and get a new email sent anyway.

The auto-renew is in the details when you subscribe and also in the email you receive, so its not really fair to suggest its BNA's fault.

Ancestry are as bad, you have to cancel any subscription with them to stop them auto-renewing, so its not limited to just FindMyPast/BNA.

As for printing, I have a Windows 7 laptop and the "Snipping Tool" is great for just copying the article I want from any page.  I don't really see the point of keeping the whole of the page because they are so large.  That said, if you wanted to, it is possible to download the whole page and also keep a "snip" of the article you want.

[Alexander.]

As for printing, I have a Windows 7 laptop and the "Snipping Tool" is great for just copying the article I want from any page.  I don't really see the point of keeping the whole of the page because they are so large.  That said, if you wanted to, it is possible to download the whole page and also keep a "snip" of the article you want.

I would advise keeping the whole page because if you just clip out an article, you have no way of knowing what newspaper, date, or page it came from.

[davidft]

As for printing, I have a Windows 7 laptop and the "Snipping Tool" is great for just copying the article I want from any page.  I don't really see the point of keeping the whole of the page because they are so large.  That said, if you wanted to, it is possible to download the whole page and also keep a "snip" of the article you want.

I would advise keeping the whole page because if you just clip out an article, you have no way of knowing what newspaper, date, or page it came from.

What I do when using the snipping tool is post the snipped article onto a word page and then just type the newspaper, date, and page it came from at the bottom.

[smudwhisk]

As for printing, I have a Windows 7 laptop and the "Snipping Tool" is great for just copying the article I want from any page.  I don't really see the point of keeping the whole of the page because they are so large.  That said, if you wanted to, it is possible to download the whole page and also keep a "snip" of the article you want.

I would advise keeping the whole page because if you just clip out an article, you have no way of knowing what newspaper, date, or page it came from.

Well you name the file with those details so its not really an issue.

[Alexander.]

Well you name the file with those details so its not really an issue.

Sure, if it's not renamed at a later date. That should be fine as long as you don't email it to anyone else - there's no telling what they will do with it.

[smudwhisk]

Well you name the file with those details so its not really an issue.

Sure, if it's not renamed at a later date. That should be fine as long as you don't email it to anyone else - there's no telling what they will do with it.

Not really an issue is it?  I name the file for my own benefit.  I've never known anything rename a file by itself.  If I was to email it someone else, what other people choose to do is up to them really, isn't it. 

With davidft's method, the same could be said about changing the text in a word document.

In fact, its no different to the OP's desire to only print part of a page (which he can't now do), you would need to keep something with the name, date and page of the newspaper for that too.