It looks like you're having a truly craptastic time of it with Ancestry's DNA processing but from what I can tell your experience is far from the norm.

As for the Autosomal DNA test (which I believe is what the OP was referring to) it was definitely NOT a waste of money. The tools available to evaluate the results leave a lot to be desired but the results themselves have been pretty beneficial and the potential is there for a lot more benefit once the Autosomal test is out of beta.

Dennis