On Ancestry can I take over management of an ancestry dna test done by member

Question

Hi, recently did an Ancestry Dna test, and noticed that my brother had already done one. However unlike me he hasn't actually built a tree on Ancestry so I dont expect has been terribly helpful, so I was going to ask him if I could manage his test then I should get access to results that I don't have (but apply to me as well) and since i have a largish tree should give me some common ancestors making it easier for me to identify then for my bother.

My question is I see yo can buy additional tests, but is there a way in ancestry to transfer an existing test to a different account, I would rather find out if this is possible before I ask him if happy to do it.

Answer 1

They cannot be moved from one account to another, but he can invite you to see the DNA results:

1. From any page on Ancestry, click the DNA tab and select Your DNA Results Summary.
2. From your DNA homepage, click Settings in the top-right corner.
3. Scroll to the Privacy section > Sharing Preferences and click Change next to DNA Ethnicity and Matches.
4. Click Add a person.
5. In the field that appears, enter the email address or Ancestry username of the person you want to invite. All invitations are delivered by email, whether you enter their email address or their username.
6. Select Viewer, Collaborator, or Manager.
   • A viewer can view your full DNA results, but can't add or change anything.
   • A collaborator can view your full DNA results, add notes, edit participant details, and link your test to a tree.
   • A manager can invite others to access your results, assign and change account roles, permanently delete your results, download DNA Data, and send and respond to messages in the test owner’s account. You can invite one person at a time to manage their test, and can add or remove a manager at any time.
7. Click Send Invitation.

As an alternative, you may ask him to use an external service like GEDMatch.

Comments

thanks so if he makes me a collabrator or manager can I add his results to my tree, and if so will Ancestry then show me any results that have a common ancestor to my brothers results.

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It will only allow you to see the information posted in the link above. I would urge you to try GEDMatch instead.

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The link is not really clear, but I will try it out

I have already tried gedmatch for my own results, but so far I have not found it very useful - https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/1258264/how-shall-i-get-started-on-gedmatch

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If he makes you a manager then you will be able to link his test to the entry you have for him in your tree. You will be able to choose whether you want to look at your matches or his matches and you can do all the same things and see all the same information for his matches that you can for your own.

In addition to my own test on Ancestry I also manage the tests for my father, uncle and aunts, which I have found useful for widening the pool of matches to examine.

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thanks, okay it worked and i linked his results to my tree and he is in the tree except when i look at his results in my account it doesnt list any common ancestors, even though there are some as I have the same match and they were listed as common ancestors to me. Do i have to trigger Ancestry to recheck the results, ir does it recheck the results automatically after some time period ?

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Did you link his results to your tree using the following process:

1. Go to the DNA tab.

2. At the top right, click on "View Another Test" and select his test.

3. At the top right, click on "Settings".

4. In the second section under "General Information", labelled "Tree Link", choose your tree, enter his name and then click on "Link DNA results".

If that is the way you did it then maybe it just takes a while for the results to update (it was a long time ago that I did it, so I can't remember if I had to wait or not).