Issues with GRO probate site

[maidmarion]

https://www.gov.uk/search-will-probate

Having big issues with the above site. It’s crashing, unable to do searches and when it finally appears to work it unfortunately won’t accept payment!

Is this an ongoing issue? Anyone else having problems?

[Andy J2022]

It has been flaky ever since they started using the new beta version of software, so maybe they are trying to fix things while keeping the site live, and that's causing these problems.
Incidentally the Probate service is the responsibility of HM Courts and Tribunals Service not the GRO. The actual day-to-day operation is provided by an outsourcing company called Iron Mountain.
Iron Mountain's claim that "Customers enjoy a more sustainable and convenient process" is highly debatable.

[carom]

I have left a couple of negative reviews on their site after having the same problems as you.

I received a reply that "Our website is fully functioning"
Best laugh of the day!

[maidmarion]

Thank you both.
I saw it was a Beta site and guessed this could be the issue.
All very frustrating to say the least.

[Kevwood]

Yes it’s not been great, I keep getting the pages come up in random order not alphabetical when searching!

[maidmarion]

I’ve just seen that the payment has been taken from my account. Not sure if this is a good thing or not after all the issues. I shall have to wait and see! 

[LizzieL]

It worked OK for me today, but I was looking up a recent will in the digital search collection for which I knew month and year of death. When I look up older wills the image search brings up a load of irrelevant image pages as well as the one I want.

[Kevwood]

It worked OK for me today, but I was looking up a recent will in the digital search collection for which I knew month and year of death. When I look up older wills the image search brings up a load of irrelevant image pages as well as the one I want.

That’s exactly what I had and in no particular order as well