ProQuest Cuts Work Force

ProQuest is well known in the genealogy world as the provider of HeritageQuest Online, a large database containing images of original U.S. census records, Revolutionary War Pension Applications, Freedman's Bank records, more than 20,000 genealogy and local history books, and more. On Wednesday the company cut 40 to 50 of its Ann Arbor, Michigan-area employees, or about 5 percent of its local work force.

ProQuest recently discovered accounting inaccuracies that a spokesman said masked the company's actual expenses. The job eliminations took place at ProQuest's Information and Learning division, the same local unit where the company said it found the accounting irregularities.

On Feb. 9, the company said it may have under-reported its expenses related to royalties and overstated revenues at the division. It said the company's financial statements going back to 1999 could no longer be relied upon. See my earlier article about the financial irregularities at http://blog.eogn.com/eastmans_online_genealogy/2006/02/proquest_to_res.html

While ProQuest has not yet issued any earnings restatements, spokesman Mark Trinske said the company has received enough information from auditors and forensic accountants to know expenses were higher than previously recorded.

"As the restatement (inquiry) is progressing and we're getting a clearer picture of the actual numbers, we needed to rebalance our expenses to reflect that,'' Trinske said, referring to the layoffs.

Trinske said all of the laid-off employees have been offered severance pay and benefits, plus job outplacement help. He could not rule out additional layoffs tied to the accounting issue until the accounting matter is resolved, but he said the company is hopeful it will not need to conduct further layoffs. With the layoffs, ProQuest employs about 650 workers in Scio Township and Ann Arbor area offices.

Trinske said the company still plans to move into its new Ann Arbor headquarters in May or June.

Comments

[Pat R.]

Ancestry/Pro Quest or whoever operates that company has done a very shabby job of accuracy in its data bases.

I notified them years ago that my grandmother was missing from their census; they said they might have missed a few pages. Yet, it remains uncorrected; and she is still deleted, nor does my father appear. We've been deleted from the world apparently.

If anyone deserved a class action over the defective product offered that libraries and individuals pay for, it is that company. In their rush to put together that company and grab the profits, if any, their quality is a disaster. It's unknown what they quaranteed to the Government to provide these services, but if pages of the census are missing, they can't have fulfilled their contract.

From other genealogists, I heard similar complaints of errors, riddled with errors, they say. If that company has taken charge of the census data for America, surely, there are many who would never question its accuracy. It's the equivalent of highjacking NARA and all of its databases, persuading the public that it is a competent source. Unknown what its error rate is, but it must be fairly high, and the idea that something like that might be copyrighted replete with errors can only be a crisis for vital records. It makes the fraudulent genealogists of the 19th and 20th century look like child's play.