Eleven complexes and adduct have been synthesized and studied by infrared. The suggested structures are discrete with tetrahedral, trigonal bipyramidal, square planar or octahedral environments around Zn, Ni, Hg and Cu centres – the coordination number is eight in the yttrium compound and ten in the dysprosium one-. The maleate anion behaves as a bidentate, a monochelating, a bichelating or a tetradentate ligand while the formiate anion behaves as a monodentate ligand. For compounds containing a protonated amine or a methanol molecule, when hydrogen bonds are considered a supramolecular architecture may be obtained.