Tell HN: Doing a chargeback against Google will get your account banned(old.reddit.com)
old.reddit.com
Tell HN: Doing a chargeback against Google will get your account banned
https://old.reddit.com/r/tifu/comments/zndbku/tifu_by_accidentally_buying_two_google_pixels_and/
287 comments
The original title is a TIFU post and I don't think those are allowed on HN.
The title is not misleading since most companies will ban you if you do a chargeback. The thing to note here is that a chargeback was done against the Google Store and the Gmail account was banned.
My goal wasn't to editorialize, I just wanted to let people know that their Gmail account was at risk if they did a chargeback against any of Google's services. This was new information to me and a lot of people on this thread.
The title is not misleading since most companies will ban you if you do a chargeback. The thing to note here is that a chargeback was done against the Google Store and the Gmail account was banned.
My goal wasn't to editorialize, I just wanted to let people know that their Gmail account was at risk if they did a chargeback against any of Google's services. This was new information to me and a lot of people on this thread.
I think if you wanted to "Tell HN" about Google's terms of service (which might very well include that a chargeback gets your entire account banned), that's fine, you could do that by leaving the URL field empty or setting it to a better source than a single anecdote. You could even link to the anecdote from the text field. But as it stands, there's a mismatch between the title and TFA.
> The original title is a TIFU post and I don't think those are allowed on HN.
Why did you think that?
> My goal wasn't to editorialize, I just wanted to let people know that their Gmail account was at risk if they did a chargeback against any of Google's services. This was new information to me and a lot of people on this thread.
Sure, and I appreciate your good intention (it was new to me too). But if you want to say what you think is important about an article, you should do it by adding a comment to the thread. Then your view will be on a level playing field with everyone else's: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
Why did you think that?
> My goal wasn't to editorialize, I just wanted to let people know that their Gmail account was at risk if they did a chargeback against any of Google's services. This was new information to me and a lot of people on this thread.
Sure, and I appreciate your good intention (it was new to me too). But if you want to say what you think is important about an article, you should do it by adding a comment to the thread. Then your view will be on a level playing field with everyone else's: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
Thanks for the feedback, I’ll be more cognizant of titles and links in the future.
Appreciated!
Perhaps you could have 's/will/may'
Honestly, the top comment is more concerning:
https://old.reddit.com/r/tifu/comments/zndbku/tifu_by_accide...
Account stolen. Obvious fraudulent charges. EA refuses to make it right. Customer rightfully disputes the charges. EA closes their account locking them out of an entire catalogue of content THEY HAD PAID for.
This whole “you don’t really own digital content” ruse needs to be popped. A company shouldn’t be able to kick you off their platform if you have purchased content from them without refunding that content or providing you physical copies of the content they’re revoking your on demand access to.
This whole “you give me $20 for a one time purchase and I’ll let you watch this movie for anywhere between 100ms and 100,000 years mostly at our discretion” isn’t business - it’s fraud and it’s shameful regulators haven’t stepped in yet.
To be clear this is about digital purchases, not digital rentals and streaming services.
https://old.reddit.com/r/tifu/comments/zndbku/tifu_by_accide...
Account stolen. Obvious fraudulent charges. EA refuses to make it right. Customer rightfully disputes the charges. EA closes their account locking them out of an entire catalogue of content THEY HAD PAID for.
This whole “you don’t really own digital content” ruse needs to be popped. A company shouldn’t be able to kick you off their platform if you have purchased content from them without refunding that content or providing you physical copies of the content they’re revoking your on demand access to.
This whole “you give me $20 for a one time purchase and I’ll let you watch this movie for anywhere between 100ms and 100,000 years mostly at our discretion” isn’t business - it’s fraud and it’s shameful regulators haven’t stepped in yet.
To be clear this is about digital purchases, not digital rentals and streaming services.
EA got hammered by the Aussie government consumer organisation in 2015 https://www.accc.gov.au/media-release/electronic-arts-undert...
Origin has now the best refund policy that I know of. It has been the case since 2014.
https://www.ea.com/legal/great-game-guarantee-terms
https://www.ea.com/legal/great-game-guarantee-terms
It's totally ridiculous. Imagine Walmart tried to do the same thing with physical goods; say any shoplifter Walmart catches immediately gets all their Walmart purchases taken back. We'd never allow it. Even if they were conflicted of theft, we wouldn't say "oh, sure, Walmart can come in and take your desk".
Why have we allowed it with digital goods?
Why have we allowed it with digital goods?
More accurate comparison: you return a purchase to Walmart for a refund - which, unlike shoplifting, is entirely legal - and they then seize all your previous Walmart purchases and ban you from the premises.
After all, disputing a charge on your credit card isn't some shady underhanded process; it's a right you have under law [1]. The real issue here is that, under digital distribution models, you have no real ownership of things you've purchased; in some sense, you're just renting or licensing them.
Merchant wants to ban your account for issuing a chargeback? Fine, but they should be required to preserve your access to purchased digital goods, or to otherwise compensate you for those goods. Consumer protection laws need to catch up to reality, and fast.
[1] https://consumer.ftc.gov/articles/using-credit-cards-disputi...
After all, disputing a charge on your credit card isn't some shady underhanded process; it's a right you have under law [1]. The real issue here is that, under digital distribution models, you have no real ownership of things you've purchased; in some sense, you're just renting or licensing them.
Merchant wants to ban your account for issuing a chargeback? Fine, but they should be required to preserve your access to purchased digital goods, or to otherwise compensate you for those goods. Consumer protection laws need to catch up to reality, and fast.
[1] https://consumer.ftc.gov/articles/using-credit-cards-disputi...
This needs to be law for what you paid for. Even the homeless setting up camp cannot have their proper removed from public places without lots of red tape.
Walmart does do this with physical goods. They treat customers like criminals when they're exiting the store with their paid for property and expect to be able to inspect your belongings.
I highly encourage anyone who feels comfortable enough to not participate in this ruse. When I get asked to please see my receipt, I say "no thank you" and keep walking. I understand it comes from a place of privilege to feel safe in doing that, and I would never want someone who doesn't feel safe to do it, but we've got to put a stop to this idea that a business has any right to "inspect" your goods after a legitimate transaction is completed.
The comment here is addressing that, in this scenario, Wallmart would be able to come to your home and "claw back" physical goods like a table or couch that was paid for legitimately IN THE PAST due to THE LATER theft.
It all comes down to DRM. The media you get to download cannot work on it's own, so you're forever tied to the store that provided it to you. Otherwise you could just store it on your own.
Meanwhile the pirates still always find their way around it, so it's the paying customers who deal with the fallout.
Meanwhile the pirates still always find their way around it, so it's the paying customers who deal with the fallout.
I don’t think that many people would complain if shoplifters were forced to return legitimately purchased wares. After all, we fine people for shoplifting. Money is fungible. So the effect is similar.
> we fine people for shoplifting
Walmart fines people for shoplifting? Of course not. That is a job of a government.
Companies should not be a judge, jury and executioner.
Walmart fines people for shoplifting? Of course not. That is a job of a government.
Companies should not be a judge, jury and executioner.
I am not a lawyer, but this is one of those things that sounds like a case for FTC. If it happened to me, I would be officially sending complaints to every single regulatory agency Google could fall under. The post does not state where customer was based, but depending on state state attorney general may get interested. It actually sounds like something that:
a) public will understand and support b) help with re-election prospects
a) public will understand and support b) help with re-election prospects
How do you feel about 999-year leases?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/999-year_lease
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/999-year_lease
How about a 9000 year lease https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guinness_Brewery
That is a specified term so much better.
This is a use case that public blockchains could solve for us. Having a decentralized proof of digital rights ownership on a public blockchain could separate the content provider (Amazon / Google / EA) from the actual media they provide by storing it on IPFS or some other decentralized file store.
There would need to be a lot of work done to make this happen and big companies would have to get on board. It doesn't seem likely now, but it might happen with enough pressure or the right disruptive catalyst.
There would need to be a lot of work done to make this happen and big companies would have to get on board. It doesn't seem likely now, but it might happen with enough pressure or the right disruptive catalyst.
So time to play the same old game: does block chain provide any value here that a separate centralized DB doesn't?
Let's see, can't you solve the exact same problem by simply having a centralized organization have a database of digital content ownership? Essentially a title record DB? Seems like it.
And how does your blockchain solution solve the problem of someone is hacking the game and needs to be banned? Can the EA ban them or do hackers get to stay for good because it's on the blockchain? And if EA can ban them at their discretion then how did the block chain solve anything here?
And so yet again someone appears to have thrown out "blockchain" when it provides zero value at all towards a solution.
Please anytime anyone proposes blockchain, please explain how it is in any way better than a separate centralized DB in your proposed use case.
Let's see, can't you solve the exact same problem by simply having a centralized organization have a database of digital content ownership? Essentially a title record DB? Seems like it.
And how does your blockchain solution solve the problem of someone is hacking the game and needs to be banned? Can the EA ban them or do hackers get to stay for good because it's on the blockchain? And if EA can ban them at their discretion then how did the block chain solve anything here?
And so yet again someone appears to have thrown out "blockchain" when it provides zero value at all towards a solution.
Please anytime anyone proposes blockchain, please explain how it is in any way better than a separate centralized DB in your proposed use case.
A centralized organization like EA, you mean? That is what parent is pointing out: you don’t own the assets under license.
If you want to see an example of decentralization in the context of a game, look at Dark Forest.
https://www.designboom.com/technology/dark-forest-one-of-a-k...
If you want to see an example of decentralization in the context of a game, look at Dark Forest.
https://www.designboom.com/technology/dark-forest-one-of-a-k...
> A centralized organization like EA, you mean?
Not like EA because that wouldn't be a separate organization / 3rd party.
The only interesting thing OP is asking for is someone other than the game company to maintain digital title tracking. That is a reasonable request. The same way your city might have a database of who owns title's for our house. A centralized database owned by a 3rd party.
But none of that has anything to do with a blockchain or being distributed. Continuously people keep mixing up having 3rd party ownership (which sometimes does help solve problems) with a blockchain (which 99 time out of 100 adds tons of complexity and usually zero or negative value). That's the key distinction being made here.
Not like EA because that wouldn't be a separate organization / 3rd party.
The only interesting thing OP is asking for is someone other than the game company to maintain digital title tracking. That is a reasonable request. The same way your city might have a database of who owns title's for our house. A centralized database owned by a 3rd party.
But none of that has anything to do with a blockchain or being distributed. Continuously people keep mixing up having 3rd party ownership (which sometimes does help solve problems) with a blockchain (which 99 time out of 100 adds tons of complexity and usually zero or negative value). That's the key distinction being made here.
Shifting the burden from the game developer to a walled garden store with digital assets (like Apple or Steam) has also not proven ideal.
Neat game and tech, but I'm still left wondering what benefit blockchain actually offers here. This looks like a run-of-the-mill Facebook/Zynga space exploration game from 15 years ago. Now, I'm no fan of either of those companies, but to my knowledge a lack of trust in the centralized server was never an issue.
What benefit justifies the drastically increased costs and reduced speeds from moving this on-chain?
What benefit justifies the drastically increased costs and reduced speeds from moving this on-chain?
Benefits: decentralized, censorship resistant, permissionless. Can’t have your account suspended, assets censored, or API key revoked by the game publisher. Can decide to build competing clients on top of the same shared structure.
Whether it’s “worth it” depends on your view. Dark Forest and L2 blockchains are much, much less expensive than a lot of modern games. The graphics are not impressive, but it’s not really relevant—anybody could build a better client; and many games can succeed despite limited graphics, such as Dwarf Fortress and Minecraft.
Whether it’s “worth it” depends on your view. Dark Forest and L2 blockchains are much, much less expensive than a lot of modern games. The graphics are not impressive, but it’s not really relevant—anybody could build a better client; and many games can succeed despite limited graphics, such as Dwarf Fortress and Minecraft.
Disclaimer: this is not my domain.
But wouldn’t the blockchain give a decentralised record of ownership that was protected from corruption? If a single entity owns this database, how does it fare against attacks/bad actors, or highly capitalists companies like EA going in and editing it in their best interests.
You need a truly good organisation to host that single DB and I’m not sure I tryst any of them at the moment.
(Also thought I have a cursory knowledge of blockchain technology, so please correct me if I’m off.)
But wouldn’t the blockchain give a decentralised record of ownership that was protected from corruption? If a single entity owns this database, how does it fare against attacks/bad actors, or highly capitalists companies like EA going in and editing it in their best interests.
You need a truly good organisation to host that single DB and I’m not sure I tryst any of them at the moment.
(Also thought I have a cursory knowledge of blockchain technology, so please correct me if I’m off.)
This isn’t really a technology problem.
Let’s say such a blockchain did exist. You buy Battlefield or some other game, years pass and EA bans your account. You want to download the game again. How are you going to do that? Sure, the blockchain is public, but EA can just maintain their own list of people to ban.
Okay, so maybe we pass a law that says that if you have a record on that blockchain companies must let you access your digital goods. You take EA to court for banning you despite having purchased the game. What’s the advantage over a database run by the government? The court trusts the government database, since they are the government, and you and EA have no choice but to listen to the court — they’re the ultimate trusted third party.
Let’s say such a blockchain did exist. You buy Battlefield or some other game, years pass and EA bans your account. You want to download the game again. How are you going to do that? Sure, the blockchain is public, but EA can just maintain their own list of people to ban.
Okay, so maybe we pass a law that says that if you have a record on that blockchain companies must let you access your digital goods. You take EA to court for banning you despite having purchased the game. What’s the advantage over a database run by the government? The court trusts the government database, since they are the government, and you and EA have no choice but to listen to the court — they’re the ultimate trusted third party.
The issue is that you need to talk to EA servers to play the game, or whatever the movie is hosted etc, and at that time they can choose to accept whatever token you have. Or they can reject it. So unless the content is also decentralized you are not better off.
Easy example is that nft tokens are decentralized, but the servers hosting the actual pictures are not. So you own the token but the picture itself can go missing.
Easy example is that nft tokens are decentralized, but the servers hosting the actual pictures are not. So you own the token but the picture itself can go missing.
Not the case with an on-chain game! See Dark Forest.
Also not really the case with on-chain NFTs or those hosted by IPFS (where as long as 1 user has the file on disk it can be recovered and re-seeded).
Also not really the case with on-chain NFTs or those hosted by IPFS (where as long as 1 user has the file on disk it can be recovered and re-seeded).
Yes, but unless the blockchain stores the actual content, you’re still at the whims of the content provider to serve the content.
After the Ethereum DAO exploit, the result was two blockchains: Ethereum Classic and Ethereum. Was that better protection against database manipulation than the existing legal system provides?
Yes, it’s much more democratic than the status quo in traditional online payment and digital asset systems. Users forked and had the choice to follow the DAO-revert chain. Another hard fork happened recently: PoS. There is still a PoW chain, for the small minority that wants to use it.
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>So time to play the same old game: does block chain provide any value here that a separate centralized DB doesn't?
Thank you for this. Reminds me of the form someone came up with about "Here's why your spam solution won't work" that was posted many times on slashdot in the '90s.
Thank you for this. Reminds me of the form someone came up with about "Here's why your spam solution won't work" that was posted many times on slashdot in the '90s.
I just consider myself the owner of the content once I have paid for it, regardless of platform. I also consider that as meaning I have carte blanche to gain possession of that content however I see fit, since I have paid for it. Torrents and cracks to the rescue, no need for blockchain technobabble.
IPFS is an open network. Putting it on there would be like putting it on a public FTP server, which would be way simpler
Your solution is equivalent to letting customers download their game installer after logging in and giving them a license key to unlock with, something we already can do, except your idea includes 10,000 more steps
Your solution is equivalent to letting customers download their game installer after logging in and giving them a license key to unlock with, something we already can do, except your idea includes 10,000 more steps
> IPFS is an open network. Putting it on there would be like putting it on a public FTP server, which would be way simpler
Not that I agree this is a good idea but IPFS decentralizes storage and provision of the content. A centralized server means the company can still arbitrarily block you.
Not that I agree this is a good idea but IPFS decentralizes storage and provision of the content. A centralized server means the company can still arbitrarily block you.
The companies will block you usually by deactivating your license key - which you always have to check online with their licensing server.
Or we could just go back to license keys as proof of ownership. Blockchain doesn't really add anything but complexity here.
this seems like an awfully complicated alternative to just letting you download a file.
The hard part isn't the prove who owns what, it's coordinating with the actual providers to have them all agree to the same database and actually honor it
> big companies would have to get on board
Will never happen.
Will never happen.
When I saw the headline, my first reaction was "You did a chargeback against a huge company from which you can't afford to be auto-unpersonned?! You crazy!"
Then I skimmed TFA, and they said that a CSR for the company told them to.
Maybe HN escalation will work, this time. But we should really figure out how the critical unique huge consumer tech companies can solve their due process problems, and be more consistent with US principles of society.
Then I skimmed TFA, and they said that a CSR for the company told them to.
Maybe HN escalation will work, this time. But we should really figure out how the critical unique huge consumer tech companies can solve their due process problems, and be more consistent with US principles of society.
A good start, at least with Google, might be for them to give anything resembling a fuck about their non-advertising customers.
My experience is that they seem to have this mindset that if you aren't paying them for advertising specifically, you're not a customer, you're a user - the product - which is true if you aren't paying them at all, but isn't even remotely the case when you're giving them money in exchange for a product. Absolutely horrendous customer service every time I've needed to contact them.
My experience is that they seem to have this mindset that if you aren't paying them for advertising specifically, you're not a customer, you're a user - the product - which is true if you aren't paying them at all, but isn't even remotely the case when you're giving them money in exchange for a product. Absolutely horrendous customer service every time I've needed to contact them.
US law doesn't seem to align with "US principles of society" if we even have such a thing. Without better consumer protection laws companies aren't going to improve in this respect.
A more-measured approach would be to just disable your ability to purchase/engage with purchased services/products.
Of course, Google is actively motivated to make forcing them to face consequences for mishandling product disputes punishable by complete ostracization from their "ecosystem".
On the one hand, this feels like a Surprised Pikachu moment: Of course a chargeback, the final legal method through which you have issues redressed, is a valid reason to deny you further access to a private company's platform.
On the other hand, I've been decoupling my life from Google's services for a reason, and I'm not the only one. Google has ceased providing products for my needs superior enough to the competition to merit putting up with the ever-looming threat of their hegemonic bullshit.
Of course, Google is actively motivated to make forcing them to face consequences for mishandling product disputes punishable by complete ostracization from their "ecosystem".
On the one hand, this feels like a Surprised Pikachu moment: Of course a chargeback, the final legal method through which you have issues redressed, is a valid reason to deny you further access to a private company's platform.
On the other hand, I've been decoupling my life from Google's services for a reason, and I'm not the only one. Google has ceased providing products for my needs superior enough to the competition to merit putting up with the ever-looming threat of their hegemonic bullshit.
> Of course a chargeback, the final legal method through which you have issues redressed, is a valid reason to deny you further access to a private company's platform.
I would completely disagree. It depends on whether the chargeback was justified. If a company illegally charges a user and the user merely declines to pay it, the subsequent blackballing (and damages associated with it) are damages of and resulting from the original crime / tort. It begins to smell like extortion.
I would completely disagree. It depends on whether the chargeback was justified. If a company illegally charges a user and the user merely declines to pay it, the subsequent blackballing (and damages associated with it) are damages of and resulting from the original crime / tort. It begins to smell like extortion.
> I would completely disagree
Would you really, though? What does "complete" disagreement take the form of here, the denial of banning for chargebacks entirely? For every random hypothetical one can provide of a company engaging in poor faith, I can invent a hypothetical of someone charging back against a company despite receiving their product in good faith. I did not say "Is always a valid reason", and it perplexes me when I receive responses that seem to deliberately interpret statements as absolutes when they aren't phrased as such. :(
Would you really, though? What does "complete" disagreement take the form of here, the denial of banning for chargebacks entirely? For every random hypothetical one can provide of a company engaging in poor faith, I can invent a hypothetical of someone charging back against a company despite receiving their product in good faith. I did not say "Is always a valid reason", and it perplexes me when I receive responses that seem to deliberately interpret statements as absolutes when they aren't phrased as such. :(
[deleted]
> Of course a chargeback, the final legal method through which you have issues redressed, is a valid reason to deny you further access to a private company's platform.
Normally I would agree, but a representative from google told OP to do a chargeback!
Normally I would agree, but a representative from google told OP to do a chargeback!
Google is historically incapable of ensuring the left hand knows what the right is doing. That isn't to say it's an okay way for things to be. It isn't.
However, if I were to get into a disagreement with Google, and a CSR told me to "do a chargeback", I would assume that CSR was engaging with me in poor faith, because these megashitcorps have a penchant for completely banning people out of hand for chargebacks to the point where it's basically autonomic. It seems like something I'd tell an annoying customer to do if they were annoying me and I was having a particularly bad day, because doing tech support is a miserable and soul-destroying job.
Again, this isn't a justification/rationalization, because this isn't an okay state of affairs in my mind, but I generally expect that a chargeback means I am ending my relationship with a business. Perhaps the OP from reddit should adopt the same mentality defensively.
However, if I were to get into a disagreement with Google, and a CSR told me to "do a chargeback", I would assume that CSR was engaging with me in poor faith, because these megashitcorps have a penchant for completely banning people out of hand for chargebacks to the point where it's basically autonomic. It seems like something I'd tell an annoying customer to do if they were annoying me and I was having a particularly bad day, because doing tech support is a miserable and soul-destroying job.
Again, this isn't a justification/rationalization, because this isn't an okay state of affairs in my mind, but I generally expect that a chargeback means I am ending my relationship with a business. Perhaps the OP from reddit should adopt the same mentality defensively.
That's the crux of the issue. If a CSR told you to jump off a bridge though... Yes you might win something if charges are pressed, but also you really should've known better.
In matters of "ToS;DR" it's generally the case that terms aligned with common expectations are enforceable but terms that don't aren't. That leaves me wondering if "chargebacks get you canceled" is a common expectation or not. The answer to this strongly influences whether my bridge analogy is accurate.
In matters of "ToS;DR" it's generally the case that terms aligned with common expectations are enforceable but terms that don't aren't. That leaves me wondering if "chargebacks get you canceled" is a common expectation or not. The answer to this strongly influences whether my bridge analogy is accurate.
Agreed. This is rather shitty thing for them to do, since most people don't use Google for ecommerce, but for just about everything else.
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The final legal method is always court. You can always file a small claims or regular civil case.
I see dozens of people do this weekly against big companies (my company, link in bio) and it does tend to work well because the legal department is generally more motivated to resolve things than customer support. Airlines and car companies are the most common disputes from our data.
That said, you can't force Google or anyone to do business with you. This kind of thing should be regulated for big gate keepers.
I see dozens of people do this weekly against big companies (my company, link in bio) and it does tend to work well because the legal department is generally more motivated to resolve things than customer support. Airlines and car companies are the most common disputes from our data.
That said, you can't force Google or anyone to do business with you. This kind of thing should be regulated for big gate keepers.
Yeah, the appropriate phrasing would have been "the final legal method you can take on your own". Obviously in America you can sue for anything on a whim.
Though, thinking about it, I am not sure that's accurate either, because it's a bit difficult do a chargeback by yourself if the card issuer doesn't want to cooperate. Whoops.
Though, thinking about it, I am not sure that's accurate either, because it's a bit difficult do a chargeback by yourself if the card issuer doesn't want to cooperate. Whoops.
I placed an order for a Pixel Watch on Black Friday as a gift. Spent $380 or so on the watch+band. Site said it would be delivered on Nov 29-Dec 2nd (and status was updated to 'Pending Shipment'). Well, Dec 5th rolled around, still wasnt shipped. Since the status was 'pending shipment' you cannot cancel the order.
I contacted google asking them to cancel my order. Two weeks later, it's still not shipped, CS rep is basically useless ("we are investigating! Thanks for your patience! :)").
Did a chargeback yesterday. Now I am running Google Takeout. Trying to figure out what happens to the domains & google fi service when my account is banned.
I am now realizing I am banking too much of my life on a company that offers 0 customer service.
On the off chance someone from Google sees this, Case is 8-4940000033434.
Is apple any better?
Who can I transfer my google domains to?
Who can I transfer my google workspaces to?
I contacted google asking them to cancel my order. Two weeks later, it's still not shipped, CS rep is basically useless ("we are investigating! Thanks for your patience! :)").
Did a chargeback yesterday. Now I am running Google Takeout. Trying to figure out what happens to the domains & google fi service when my account is banned.
I am now realizing I am banking too much of my life on a company that offers 0 customer service.
On the off chance someone from Google sees this, Case is 8-4940000033434.
Is apple any better?
Who can I transfer my google domains to?
Who can I transfer my google workspaces to?
Similar experience (Google charged me for a phone that was never delivered). I was debating doing a chargeback, but the fear of losing my stupid google account was causing me to pause. I finally DM'ed Google Fi support on Twitter and they eventually were able to get me in contact with someone that could help. It took about 2 months to get this resolved. Buying from Google is a nightmare (I like the product, why do they ruin all my good-will toward them?). I have never had a worse experience with a company.
I don't use any Apple products at all, but it seems like they'd have to be better if only because they have physical stores you can go in and complain your way up the retail chain to force some sort of response.
Google in my experience is basically a giant black hole if you need any real service on the consumer side. This is one of the various reasons that like others in this thread I've disconnected myself from any reliance on Google services over the past few years. Having the vast majority of my digital identity linked to a single gmail account was super convenient, but there's way too much downside risk if someone at google decides to shut you out for any reason.
Google in my experience is basically a giant black hole if you need any real service on the consumer side. This is one of the various reasons that like others in this thread I've disconnected myself from any reliance on Google services over the past few years. Having the vast majority of my digital identity linked to a single gmail account was super convenient, but there's way too much downside risk if someone at google decides to shut you out for any reason.
Apple customer support isn’t as great as it used to be, but it’s still very good.
You can get to a human pretty fast, you have to go through an annoying script, but at least it’s with human and not a badly written automation.
You can get to a human pretty fast, you have to go through an annoying script, but at least it’s with human and not a badly written automation.
Call your card and tell them to cancel the chargeback.
This served as a wake up call more than anything to break my reliance on google. I wont be cancelling the chargeback.
TIL never to buy physical products directly from Google!
Or for that matter to never use Google Pay, even if the c/c charge isn't run by them. You could go from "credit card buyer protection" to Google Doomsday with a single disputed charge.
I wonder how they handle "bank reversals", where a report of a stolen card (but not specifically a customer-generated chargeback) results in a reversal of the charge by the bank and issuance of a new c/c?
The difference being that a customer-generated chargeback for "goods or services not delivered" is handled differently by the bank than a "my card was stolen, reverse these charges" issue.
Or for that matter to never use Google Pay, even if the c/c charge isn't run by them. You could go from "credit card buyer protection" to Google Doomsday with a single disputed charge.
I wonder how they handle "bank reversals", where a report of a stolen card (but not specifically a customer-generated chargeback) results in a reversal of the charge by the bank and issuance of a new c/c?
The difference being that a customer-generated chargeback for "goods or services not delivered" is handled differently by the bank than a "my card was stolen, reverse these charges" issue.
I would rather suggest the following: do not buy anything worth more than $99 from companies which do not offer human support.
And if you decide to do chargeback assume that that is a "nuclear option": that you will never be able to use that company again.
And if you decide to do chargeback assume that that is a "nuclear option": that you will never be able to use that company again.
To further my question:
I have a c/c I use for Google. Said card # is stolen, and used to buy Google services (under a different ID). I call the bank, they cancel the card and refund the amounts charged to Google for the unknown services.
What is the chance of Google cancelling my other account, since it was on the same card?
I have a c/c I use for Google. Said card # is stolen, and used to buy Google services (under a different ID). I call the bank, they cancel the card and refund the amounts charged to Google for the unknown services.
What is the chance of Google cancelling my other account, since it was on the same card?
> What is the chance of Google cancelling my other account,
> since it was on the same card?
Quite high. Majority of companies have this automated.
> since it was on the same card?
Quite high. Majority of companies have this automated.
Very good point about Google Pay. I never thought of that but you're right. If some vendor's misbehaviour ends up cascading in my losing access tp my Google account this would be catastrophic.
Thanks a lot. Removing it now.
Many people (including me) raised this issue internally at Google more than a decade ago now during the Google+ era. Vic Gundotra decided that not using your "real name" was a bannable offense despite the many legitimate concerns people brought up [1].
This was of course an automatic process and there were (completely predictably) false positives. This would kill your entire Google account, Gmail included.
I was one of many voices who argued that was completely stupid. The worst thing that should happen is a policy violation on a given service should terminate or suspend that service only. It should NEVER kill Gmail. Why? Because the end result is people will ultimately only use their Google account for Gmail.
That's what I have done since and what I recommend everyone else do. Never tie your Google account to any other Google product. You may well regret it.
It's wild to me that this is still the case. The issue isn't large enough for any executive to care. That means the decision will come down to a few stubborn individuals (probably a VP of PM) who are maintaining this position.
There's nothing you can buy from the Google Store that you can't get from Best Buy or Amazon and those will be infinitely more accountable.
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMqZ2PPOLik
This was of course an automatic process and there were (completely predictably) false positives. This would kill your entire Google account, Gmail included.
I was one of many voices who argued that was completely stupid. The worst thing that should happen is a policy violation on a given service should terminate or suspend that service only. It should NEVER kill Gmail. Why? Because the end result is people will ultimately only use their Google account for Gmail.
That's what I have done since and what I recommend everyone else do. Never tie your Google account to any other Google product. You may well regret it.
It's wild to me that this is still the case. The issue isn't large enough for any executive to care. That means the decision will come down to a few stubborn individuals (probably a VP of PM) who are maintaining this position.
There's nothing you can buy from the Google Store that you can't get from Best Buy or Amazon and those will be infinitely more accountable.
[1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HMqZ2PPOLik
Or just don’t use gmail. Email is way too important to me (and most people) to risk losing because an automated system thought I broke the TOS of an unrelated Google product. Even if you keep separate accounts, there’s nothing to stop them correlating those accounts and banning you anyway.
Don’t use gmail as your primary email provider.
Don’t use gmail as your primary email provider.
I agree fully. There are plenty of competitors to choose from for a service so critical, and you’ll do even better if you buy your own domain and untie your email address from your email provider.
Most services ask for a confirmation via SMS. I have a few account in gmail (personal, work, another part of work, side project, ...). If they ban one of them, can they ban all of them?
Each nym you establish should have its own, unique, 2FA mule.
Voice and sms only SIM card is only $6/mo from tello…
Voice and sms only SIM card is only $6/mo from tello…
And you can still create a (free) Google Account without GMail: https://accounts.google.com/SignUpWithoutGmail
I lost the ability to use adwords. It has always been denied. I was never given a reason, and any attempt to appeal the decision were declined. I used my own email account to set up an account for a business, and the traffic may have been unusual because it was banner ads on the website of the local ISP. So, the ISP owned all of the IP addresses even though they were uniquely different people. And the office had multiple people in it so there is a chance that someone in the office may have, at some point, clicked on a banner advertisement themselves. I have no idea.
I have not tried in a few years, but I was nearing the 10 year mark previously, and they still would not allow me to use adwords. I am not sure if it is a lifetime ban or what.
I have not tried in a few years, but I was nearing the 10 year mark previously, and they still would not allow me to use adwords. I am not sure if it is a lifetime ban or what.
Per-service bans seems like the obvious thing.
Sure, there will be some rough edges (what when I am banned from GDrive but not Gmail, but then I click the 'save to drive' button in gmail?). Who will test that codepath?
How about when i DDoS the antivirus service API? - does that mean my email will no longer be scanned?
But a few rough edges for a few users seems better than a few users very unhappy and enough to become negative PR sources for life.
Sure, there will be some rough edges (what when I am banned from GDrive but not Gmail, but then I click the 'save to drive' button in gmail?). Who will test that codepath?
How about when i DDoS the antivirus service API? - does that mean my email will no longer be scanned?
But a few rough edges for a few users seems better than a few users very unhappy and enough to become negative PR sources for life.
Technically Google already has per-service bans for Google Ads and YouTube. That doesn't help if you get banned for a reason unrelated to those services however.
Google is run by people who think like robots
> Never tie your Google account to any other Google product.
Google pretty much forces you to do so.
Google pretty much forces you to do so.
Yeah, either you'd get your gmail account banned because of something happened in google ads, or they ban you for having multiple accounts and trying to "circumvent their anti-abuse policy" or something.
The only way to win this game is to not play it.
The only way to win this game is to not play it.
Before this happens to you too: rclone[0] can be used to sync (or pull) data from Google's services to a local machine. It's pretty slow, but it "just works"^TM
[0] https://rclone.org, https://rclone.org/drive/, https://rclone.org/googlephotos/
[0] https://rclone.org, https://rclone.org/drive/, https://rclone.org/googlephotos/
Google takeout is a much much better option.
Can't say I've used rclone for this, but I wouldn't discard it so easily
I have a rather large library from Takeout and it's been a burden.
It seems I'm going to need to write something to interpret their metadata to make it remotely useful again; they provide a flat archive with images and JSON files.
If I have to do this, I'd rather pick my tools on familiarity - compared to Takeout, I have slightly more with rclone
Truth be told I'm a data hoarder, I'll probably do both and reconcile
I have a rather large library from Takeout and it's been a burden.
It seems I'm going to need to write something to interpret their metadata to make it remotely useful again; they provide a flat archive with images and JSON files.
If I have to do this, I'd rather pick my tools on familiarity - compared to Takeout, I have slightly more with rclone
Truth be told I'm a data hoarder, I'll probably do both and reconcile
From my experience, the mbox file from Google Takeout breaks some non-ASCII non-UTF8 characters from old emails you may have received (they are all replaced by 0xEFBFBD. No way to solve this). This issue does not happen when backuping emails with IMAP or GYB/GMvault (by the way I have written this little tool to use/explore GMVault backups https://github.com/karteum/gmvaultdb :).
It seems I'm not the only one experiencing those encoding issues with Google Takeout https://webapps.stackexchange.com/questions/71153/takeout-br...
It seems I'm not the only one experiencing those encoding issues with Google Takeout https://webapps.stackexchange.com/questions/71153/takeout-br...
Which cannot be automated, AFAICT. I'm syncing pictures of 4 GooglePhoto accounts twice a week each on a machine at home. Fire and forget.
But yeah, Google takeout can be done once a month if you have time to spare for that task.
But yeah, Google takeout can be done once a month if you have time to spare for that task.
rclone's documentation warns you that you can't actually get the original resolution photos back out via the Photos API. Better than nothing, obviously, but...
Many don't realise that they aren't even storing the full quality originals on Google at all.
To be sure I backup my phone's photos using rsync (via termux) to my own backup locations.
To be sure I backup my phone's photos using rsync (via termux) to my own backup locations.
... just a confirmation that signing for anything on google just makes you their hostage. I'm happy I quit them 5 years ago after I couldn't have access to my mail anymore after I stepped down my paid drive access to free one and I didn't have space anymore to receive emails.
Because that hit you by surprise, or because you intended to keep all those photos while on the free tier?
It seems to me like deleting the files over your storage limit is the easy path for both you and google and I don't see how this is an example of holding you hostage. At most bad communication and a lack of warning.
It seems to me like deleting the files over your storage limit is the easy path for both you and google and I don't see how this is an example of holding you hostage. At most bad communication and a lack of warning.
Don't remember exactly but I was expecting not the two services being linked. IIRC I already downloaded back a lot of pictures and my free plan was something like 99% full. The fact that Google blocked my email reception without any notice was hard to swallow.
Yes and no. It's more like google held them hostage and then just shot them without a request for ransom. It is the easy path though, I agree.
If you stop paying for data storage, the default is you should expect it to be deleted.
If there was a problem with insufficient warning, that's a problem, but not a hostage problem.
If there was a problem with insufficient warning, that's a problem, but not a hostage problem.
There's also this, which uses Chrome DevTools to automatically scrape it all: https://github.com/perkeep/gphotos-cdp
Correct.
I want very much for the rclone/Gmail integration to work well but it’s very complicated and fussy.
You are better off doing a takeout and downloading in your browser.
I want very much for the rclone/Gmail integration to work well but it’s very complicated and fussy.
You are better off doing a takeout and downloading in your browser.
The limitations page for the Google Photos backend [1] is something to behold. I can't imagine very many people would view this as a viable alternative to Takeout with the current limitations. This bolded one seems like it would be a dealbreaker for most people with photos:
> The current google API does not allow photos to be downloaded at original resolution. This is very important if you are, for example, relying on "Google Photos" as a backup of your photos. You will not be able to use rclone to redownload original images. You could use 'google takeout' to recover the original photos as a last resort
[1] https://rclone.org/googlephotos/#limitations
> The current google API does not allow photos to be downloaded at original resolution. This is very important if you are, for example, relying on "Google Photos" as a backup of your photos. You will not be able to use rclone to redownload original images. You could use 'google takeout' to recover the original photos as a last resort
[1] https://rclone.org/googlephotos/#limitations
To me, the issue with Google's products and services is that they're not willing to provide any human customer service to resolve the real issues.
Now, of course, I understand that even Google can't reasonably be expected to provide free 24/7 customer support for the entire Internet. If they had a normal phone number available where anybody could reach a human at any time, every confused person would call them with issues that are completely unrelated to Google's actual products and even Google would be overwhelmed.
The solution is to figure out some payment level for support that dissuades casual abuse of customer service, but is still reasonable for people to use in an emergency to save their business or communication accounts.
I'm convinced that at least some people have lost jobs and companies, had their lives ruined, or even committed suicide over being completely unable to salvage everything they've worked for all of their lives. This should be horrifying to every Google employee.
Now, of course, I understand that even Google can't reasonably be expected to provide free 24/7 customer support for the entire Internet. If they had a normal phone number available where anybody could reach a human at any time, every confused person would call them with issues that are completely unrelated to Google's actual products and even Google would be overwhelmed.
The solution is to figure out some payment level for support that dissuades casual abuse of customer service, but is still reasonable for people to use in an emergency to save their business or communication accounts.
I'm convinced that at least some people have lost jobs and companies, had their lives ruined, or even committed suicide over being completely unable to salvage everything they've worked for all of their lives. This should be horrifying to every Google employee.
> Now, of course, I understand that even Google can't reasonably be expected to provide free 24/7 customer support for the entire Internet. If they had a normal phone number available where anybody could reach a human at any time, every confused person would call them with issues that are completely unrelated to Google's actual products and even Google would be overwhelmed.
No it is entirely reasonable. Even with a decline this quarter, Alphabet is sitting on ~$116 Billion cash on hand. Spending $1B on customer service would be trivial.
They won't though, because end-users are not the customers of Google, advertisers are. You can betcha advertisers get excellent customer service.
No it is entirely reasonable. Even with a decline this quarter, Alphabet is sitting on ~$116 Billion cash on hand. Spending $1B on customer service would be trivial.
They won't though, because end-users are not the customers of Google, advertisers are. You can betcha advertisers get excellent customer service.
> They won't though, because end-users are not the customers of Google, advertisers are. You can betcha advertisers get excellent customer service.
You would think so, but no. Even advertisers get bad support from Google. Even companies using Google as replacement for Microsoft stack (Gmail and Calendar instead of Outlook, etc) get bad support from Google. Even Google Cloud customers spending millions a year get bad support from Google.
The terrible support might have started for the reasons you mention, but it turn into whole organization dysfunction.
You would think so, but no. Even advertisers get bad support from Google. Even companies using Google as replacement for Microsoft stack (Gmail and Calendar instead of Outlook, etc) get bad support from Google. Even Google Cloud customers spending millions a year get bad support from Google.
The terrible support might have started for the reasons you mention, but it turn into whole organization dysfunction.
Can confirm. I work for a company that spends >$10MM on google cloud compute every year, and it's a common internal joke that "talk to google support" means "get fucked." Their support is outrageously bad.
Even websites using Google's advertising platform to serve those advertisements get horrible support.
This is just not true from my experience. Google Cloud has proactive and responsive support staff.
It might be a relative perspective they had. I've heard that AWS and Azure provide much better support. I can't say firsthand, but I've heard that fairly consistently.
The joke we had was AWS has better support, Google had better products, and MS had better sales.
Yeah, WTH. The Reddit thread is about a transaction involving money. Google can't do better support than ineffective, then incorrect, directions?
Furthermore, if Google is going to shove search, email, maps, Chrome, ChromeOS, Play Store, Android, etc, etc, etc, down our throats maybe they should be made to actually do a little customer service.
Furthermore, if Google is going to shove search, email, maps, Chrome, ChromeOS, Play Store, Android, etc, etc, etc, down our throats maybe they should be made to actually do a little customer service.
> They won't though, because end-users are not the customers of Google, advertisers are. You can betcha advertisers get excellent customer service.
Have you ever advertised on Google? I'm guessing not.
Go search on Reddit and other places for stories from people who got their Google Ads accounts banned, including advertisers spending millions of dollars a year, and see how much help from customer service they've gotten.
Excellent might not be the word that comes to mind after you've been through that exercise.
Have you ever advertised on Google? I'm guessing not.
Go search on Reddit and other places for stories from people who got their Google Ads accounts banned, including advertisers spending millions of dollars a year, and see how much help from customer service they've gotten.
Excellent might not be the word that comes to mind after you've been through that exercise.
I think that's a sore underestimation of the support costs Google would have to cover. It looks like support costs average around $4/call. (https://www.google.com/search?q=how+much+does+the+average+su...). Google has approximately 4 billion users (https://www.google.com/search?q=how+many+users+does+Google+h...). So, if you allowed for one single support call per user per year, Google would be footing $16B annually.
In general, I don't think you can expect free support for a free product. I do think businesses should let you buy support for any tier of product, both as part of a subscription and on a one-time basis.
In general, I don't think you can expect free support for a free product. I do think businesses should let you buy support for any tier of product, both as part of a subscription and on a one-time basis.
That’s at 98 cents per minute, I suspect at google’s scale they would have massive cost savings.
Savings from scale usually comes from automation, and people are generally looking to talk to humans, not bots. This is the exact reason Google avoids human support in the first place - there are no massive cost savings, because it does not scale well.
There’s a lot to automate when doing phone support. The vast difference between the sub 20 cents per minute you need to pay people to answer phones and the 98 cents per minute each call costs are largely things that could be automated.
And that’s ignoring trying to minimize call length or even the need for any calls in the first place.
And that’s ignoring trying to minimize call length or even the need for any calls in the first place.
There are definite cost reductions that can be made, but they pale in comparison to keeping humans out of the loop.
For sake of argument, let's pretend you can shave half off the costs. So, now we're talking $8B annually for one support call / user / year. Does this undermine my argument about under-estimation of $1B costs?
For sake of argument, let's pretend you can shave half off the costs. So, now we're talking $8B annually for one support call / user / year. Does this undermine my argument about under-estimation of $1B costs?
That’s just the most obvious approach, adjusting the product and internal processes to avoid having people call is even more effective. Upselling people is another way to drop net costs even further, etc.
I suspect they could get net costs below 800m/year.
I suspect they could get net costs below 800m/year.
Ok, I agree to disagree then! :)
Advertisers are not getting any customer service from Google, at all. I've had accounts locked for no reason, ads cut off, etc.
Their ad platform is so confusing, I had to take a Udemy course just to make head or tails of it.
This is besides the fact that their ads are nowhere near as effective as on other platforms.
Their ad platform is so confusing, I had to take a Udemy course just to make head or tails of it.
This is besides the fact that their ads are nowhere near as effective as on other platforms.
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> Now, of course, I understand that even Google can't reasonably be expected to provide free 24/7 customer support for the entire Internet. If they had a normal phone number available where anybody could reach a human at any time, every confused person would call them with issues that are completely unrelated to Google's actual products and even Google would be overwhelmed.
That would be the fair consequence of wanting to dominate the whole internet, no?
If any company providing a product would refuse to have a human that is reachable, they would never get to a dominating position.
And IMHO, google should be forced to provide that human service given its dimension, or scale down until it does.
That would be the fair consequence of wanting to dominate the whole internet, no?
If any company providing a product would refuse to have a human that is reachable, they would never get to a dominating position.
And IMHO, google should be forced to provide that human service given its dimension, or scale down until it does.
I said that because of my life experience. I run some small businesses in some quasi-technical fields.
We've gotten phone calls asking for help with fixing peoples' Yahoo mail accounts, asking for returns to stores that were completely different than ours, trying to get refunds on products we don't even sell, and many other nonsensical and time-wasting calls from confused people.
If we, at our extremely small scale, were often annoyed by dealing with irrelevant phone calls, I have no doubt that Google would be drowned out by every person who had an issue installing Windows, trying to setup their printer, asking for help getting their money back from a shoe store, running out of gas on the highway, their apartment not turning on the heat high enough, and a host of unrelated things that most of us would never dream of calling Google about.
I'm not asking for perfection from Google: I'm just asking for Google to help desperate people that are completely screwed and giving them some option, even if it requires some payment, to fix major life-changing issues.
We've gotten phone calls asking for help with fixing peoples' Yahoo mail accounts, asking for returns to stores that were completely different than ours, trying to get refunds on products we don't even sell, and many other nonsensical and time-wasting calls from confused people.
If we, at our extremely small scale, were often annoyed by dealing with irrelevant phone calls, I have no doubt that Google would be drowned out by every person who had an issue installing Windows, trying to setup their printer, asking for help getting their money back from a shoe store, running out of gas on the highway, their apartment not turning on the heat high enough, and a host of unrelated things that most of us would never dream of calling Google about.
I'm not asking for perfection from Google: I'm just asking for Google to help desperate people that are completely screwed and giving them some option, even if it requires some payment, to fix major life-changing issues.
That is the price of dealing with the public, tbf.
People are how they are and will always find the path of least resistance to get their problems solved.
That doesn't exclude them or anyone from providing support to the services they offer, and that people pay for (one way or the other)
People are how they are and will always find the path of least resistance to get their problems solved.
That doesn't exclude them or anyone from providing support to the services they offer, and that people pay for (one way or the other)
Having a costumer only hotline which only connects you after entering your customer ID and or Support-PIN would be a start. I know of multiple company's which have that.
Maybe they could sell the space at the beginning of each call and run an ad there?
There's a massive cultural blind spot at Google IMHO. And it's not as black and white as "if you're not the customer you're the product".
I used to be a paying Google Workspace customer and I cancelled my account through the usual process. After my account was closed _and deleted_ they sent some unknown invoice amount to collections, sent threatening emails.
Was there a reply-to? Was there a phone number? No, "log in with your account and raise a support issue". The account that you deleted. And another threatening email with no help about how to answer. I emailed the Collections address and I got auto-generated responses.
And I spent days combing help pages. Finally sorted it out by opening a new trial account (and then the help agent was very helpful). But even then it was awkward.
I will never send a cent their way.
Oh, and I know a google employee who was kind enought to look into it. He followed the internal channels to try and help and ... it was broken. Best he could do was file a bug report.
I used to be a paying Google Workspace customer and I cancelled my account through the usual process. After my account was closed _and deleted_ they sent some unknown invoice amount to collections, sent threatening emails.
Was there a reply-to? Was there a phone number? No, "log in with your account and raise a support issue". The account that you deleted. And another threatening email with no help about how to answer. I emailed the Collections address and I got auto-generated responses.
And I spent days combing help pages. Finally sorted it out by opening a new trial account (and then the help agent was very helpful). But even then it was awkward.
I will never send a cent their way.
Oh, and I know a google employee who was kind enought to look into it. He followed the internal channels to try and help and ... it was broken. Best he could do was file a bug report.
> Now, of course, I understand that even Google can't reasonably be expected to provide free 24/7 customer support for the entire Internet.
Microsoft did this back in the 1990's. It provided a strong financial incentive to reduce the number of support calls generated per Windows installation, which is what they ended up doing.
Microsoft did this back in the 1990's. It provided a strong financial incentive to reduce the number of support calls generated per Windows installation, which is what they ended up doing.
And often Microsoft would not put the charge through, at least if you were working to try to solve the problem without them. I don't know what their criteria were, but I don't think I ever paid despite calling a few times.
The terms I remember (note that there are so many different Microsoft licensing agreements, so yours could’ve been totally different) were that you weren’t charged if the problem you called for was indeed a problem with Microsoft software.
And that definition was quite liberal: not just obvious software bugs, but also confusing documentation, etc.
In other words, as long as you RTFM before you called, it was free.
And that definition was quite liberal: not just obvious software bugs, but also confusing documentation, etc.
In other words, as long as you RTFM before you called, it was free.
That’s still the case today, even though the base charge is now $500/incident. I always get a refund.
I think you might be conflating "free users" of their search engine product and a customer who paid a thousand USD to purchase their mobile hardware. I can see the reasoning for refusing to provide human-based CS for their search engine users, but to give their Pixel users the typical run around and then capping it with disabling their account? I would expect this kind of behavior from the various shell companies selling gadgets on Amazon. Google is really eating their way through the goodwill they took decades to build up.
> Google can't reasonably be expected to provide free 24/7 customer support for the entire Internet
IMO they should be legally required to provide an appeals process with a real human and reasonable turnaround time (e.g. 1 business day would probably be fine with me) for all forms of account banning or website banning. For payment disputes they should also be legally required to provide human assistance within a few business days. If you can't do that then you shouldn't be allowed to take payments.
I had a location-based file sharing website banned across the internet because Chrome falsely labelled it as a suspicious website or some BS. That new Chrome version marked the end of that project. No way to reach a human. I can't imagine how many businesses and startups have been ended because of Google's rash policies and no appeal process.
IMO they should be legally required to provide an appeals process with a real human and reasonable turnaround time (e.g. 1 business day would probably be fine with me) for all forms of account banning or website banning. For payment disputes they should also be legally required to provide human assistance within a few business days. If you can't do that then you shouldn't be allowed to take payments.
I had a location-based file sharing website banned across the internet because Chrome falsely labelled it as a suspicious website or some BS. That new Chrome version marked the end of that project. No way to reach a human. I can't imagine how many businesses and startups have been ended because of Google's rash policies and no appeal process.
Did you try opening a bug report on the public Chromium bug tracker?
> they're not willing to provide any human customer service
They do: https://one.google.com/about/support
They do: https://one.google.com/about/support
Google One is only a few bucks a month and gives human support. It certainly helped me in getting someone from Google confirm to me with written info that an issue I was having was caused by the phone manufacturer and not Google.
Now, of course, I understand that even Google can't reasonably be expected to provide free 24/7 customer support for the entire Internet.
How about only paying customers outside of consumer subscription services (and maybe even those)? I don't know why it's reasonable to expect them not to be able to provide that service at volume when I can and have reached amazon support for small sales and even before sale events and I'm sure they move more stuff around than google does pixel phones.
How about only paying customers outside of consumer subscription services (and maybe even those)? I don't know why it's reasonable to expect them not to be able to provide that service at volume when I can and have reached amazon support for small sales and even before sale events and I'm sure they move more stuff around than google does pixel phones.
<< Now, of course, I understand that even Google can't reasonably be expected to provide free 24/7 customer support for the entire Internet.
See... for me that is actually an argument that they are way too big, because they are not able to properly service their existing customer base.
See... for me that is actually an argument that they are way too big, because they are not able to properly service their existing customer base.
I think a reasonable law here would be: If you paid real money for services, you're entitled to direct human to human customer support.
> o me, the issue with Google's products and services is that they're not willing to provide any human customer service to resolve the real issues.
I don't get this, I engage human Google support for paid Google products at least a few times a month. It's not great, but definitely on par with other tech giants. Are you expecting human support for ... free services?
I don't get this, I engage human Google support for paid Google products at least a few times a month. It's not great, but definitely on par with other tech giants. Are you expecting human support for ... free services?
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He paid them money for a phone they themselves lost and then charged him for. He should reasonably expect support for that transaction and any situations that stem directly from that transaction. Furthermore when you do something that deleteriously effects people like take away access to more than a decade of email/files/photos/contacts not to mention apps and other purchases for which google was indeed paid you should expect that action to reasonably generate a support request and actually provide it in case as in this situation it is unreasonable and unjust.
But its free isn't an automatic get out of jail free card for the expectation for a company to behave like reasonable human beings.
But its free isn't an automatic get out of jail free card for the expectation for a company to behave like reasonable human beings.
"Free services" aren't provided by Google out of the goodness of their heart. This isn't altruism. We're not choosy beggars to want support for being the very products that make Google the most money.
I don’t know what consumer support looks like, but Google Cloud support (with a premium support contract) is significantly worse then their competitors.
Over the years I’ve read so many horror stories of people being locked out of their Google accounts for a wide variety of reasons. Trying to get Google’s help is like pleading for help by sending messages to /dev/null.
I’ve migrated everything I possibly can off their services as a result. Google Maps and YouTube I find hard or impossible to really replace but I don’t have any critical data there.
I remember how exciting it was when Google IPOed (2005?). I was rooting for them. Every passing year my opinion of them diminishes further.
I’ve migrated everything I possibly can off their services as a result. Google Maps and YouTube I find hard or impossible to really replace but I don’t have any critical data there.
I remember how exciting it was when Google IPOed (2005?). I was rooting for them. Every passing year my opinion of them diminishes further.
Don't Be Evil turned into Don't Use Google
The only monetary relationship I have with Google is a paid youtube sub.
I actively avoid getting involved in any business relationship with Google because of the mountain of evidence that it’s a bad idea. No Google suite. No Google cloud. No hardware.
Google is an advertising company. They make their money from advertising and the rest of the revenue is a pittance to them, so they have no incentive to provide any support or empathy.
Avoid doing non-advertising business with Google at all costs.
I actively avoid getting involved in any business relationship with Google because of the mountain of evidence that it’s a bad idea. No Google suite. No Google cloud. No hardware.
Google is an advertising company. They make their money from advertising and the rest of the revenue is a pittance to them, so they have no incentive to provide any support or empathy.
Avoid doing non-advertising business with Google at all costs.
I'm in the same boat as you, only youtube left, I moved all services away from google and I'm working actively to move us away from Google Cloud, funny, I think I started using google around 2001 and now I want to stop using it because of all these incidents. Also their OSS sucks, they won't take any PRs from externals.
While on topic, how independent is Go? Is Google still the main decision maker there?
I work in payments. This is pretty normal AFAIK. Doing a chargeback is a good way to be "fired" as a customer and not allowed to use that companies services anymore.
google is not a small local shop only responsible for one tiny part of your life like a plumber. They have actively sought to make themselves integral to your whole life. When the plumber fires you, you do not lose access to your retirement account because ypu can no longer prove your identity because your phone and email both went up in smoke. That comes with responsibility. This is a quite false equivalence. Chargebacks are bad? Yes, well, so is not having human customer service.
The plumber has a wife answering the phone who can be reasoned with and who can reason with you and you can arrive at some compromise or understanding or other deal before getting to a chargeback. And that's just for a noncritical service. What compromise or understanding does google offer? For their service which they have actively made as critical as possible?
This sob story about how bad chargebacks are falls flat.
The plumber has a wife answering the phone who can be reasoned with and who can reason with you and you can arrive at some compromise or understanding or other deal before getting to a chargeback. And that's just for a noncritical service. What compromise or understanding does google offer? For their service which they have actively made as critical as possible?
This sob story about how bad chargebacks are falls flat.
I agree that having poor customer service is unacceptable. I agree that losing your access to email is a tragic thing and extremely difficult to resolve all the other issues that come with that. I'm not really commenting on the situation other than that issuing a chargeback commonly results in a loss of access to that companies services.
Isn't this a great way to motivate users to respond by setting up throw-away accounts, with disposable forwarding emails and Privacy.com-generated credit card numbers? True, this is a multi-step process, but it also seems like something which could be automated.
I was told by experienced web developer to do exactly this: every time I need something for Google I must create new address and new identity. If something goes wrong only project related identity gets destroyed and I can access other accounts.
My experience with those generated CC numbers has been poor. A lot of sites somehow recognize them and reject them.
First digits of the credit card tells you what card it is and who is the issuer. Detecting privacy.com is just a matter of knowing their ranges.
They also themselves will prevent you from using those cards to break ToS if they can detect it (i.e. multiple sign-ups for known service).
They also themselves will prevent you from using those cards to break ToS if they can detect it (i.e. multiple sign-ups for known service).
I don't know if I'm having a false memory but it think someone some time ago commented here on a similar topic that they got banned on Google for using a virtual card
There are often a variety of ways that duplicate accounts are detected, device ID, ip addresses, phone numbers, fingerprints, physical addresses, etc.
IIRC google requires a non-voip phone, so you’ll need a burner phone too if you want to go that route.
IIRC google requires a non-voip phone, so you’ll need a burner phone too if you want to go that route.
Virtual cards are often associated with fraud or malicious actions and may be rejected entirely. Generating cards probably can be done programmatically, but so can recognizing and blocking those cards.
I can get unique CC number for every transaction. Normal service from my bank.
What country? What bank???
This is normal in Portugal.
I can generate single-use cards with an arbitrary limit, limit cards that can be used any number of times, and cards with a monthly renewing limit.
This works for literally any bank in Portugal via an app called MBWay.
I can generate single-use cards with an arbitrary limit, limit cards that can be used any number of times, and cards with a monthly renewing limit.
This works for literally any bank in Portugal via an app called MBWay.
France, virtually any major bank really: LCL, Boursorama, Societe Generale, etc.
Brazil, at least Itaú does this.
That's not really the problem. The problem is that *customer support* suggested to do so.
Yeah there is no excuse for Google not to make an exception to the policy when Google told the poster to do the chargeback.
Google logs everything about everyone, but somehow doesn't have a record of themselves telling the user to do something.
Man it sure is a great gig being google!
Man it sure is a great gig being google!
This is the inevitable result of automation. There is no negotiating with a piece of code.
It’s not inevitable. Of course it can be overridden.
But by who? There’s nobody to hire for that role, because the role has been automated.
I have no idea if you're being serious, but of course code can be overridden and of course you can hire someone to override it. Google has apparently chosen not to.
Hiring someone to do a thing is the opposite of automating it.
I think the chargeback here was a personal "go f yourself" move from the supervisor to a "troublesome" client, not Google.
If the customer was told to do a chargeback by a Google employee (or outsourced contractor) then it was _Google_ who told the customer to do the chargeback.
Every action by myself acting in my official capacity is an action by my company and they cannot disentangle themselves from that obligation by blaming an employee.
That's definitely a problem. But a lot of people seem surprised that issuing a chargeback can result in a loss of access to company services. So was just sharing from my work experience.
It's normal if you're a store someone can go elsewhere to do business.
It should be illegal if you're a global monopoly where it's nearly impossible to function in modern society without an account to.
The problem I see time and time again, is that Google acts like it is completely unaware it's a monopoly.
It should be illegal if you're a global monopoly where it's nearly impossible to function in modern society without an account to.
The problem I see time and time again, is that Google acts like it is completely unaware it's a monopoly.
How is google a monopoly? I get by just fine without it.
Do you have an Android phone? It's getting harder to use them without a Google account.
In my university, professors and old T.A. have a mix of gmail, hotmail and yahoo, let's say 1/3, 1/3 and 1/3. But students have almost 100% emails from gmail.
I't not a monopoly, but it's getting very close.
In my university, professors and old T.A. have a mix of gmail, hotmail and yahoo, let's say 1/3, 1/3 and 1/3. But students have almost 100% emails from gmail.
I't not a monopoly, but it's getting very close.
An email monopoly, perhaps, but not a comms monopoly. I bet the students have snapchat, whatsapp, fb messanger, etc maybe signal or telegram too. Plus mms and phone for 2fa. But yeah, email is quite special for password recovery so its a good point you're making.
No I don’t use Android on any device.
Some people wrote letters in 1980. That ain’t a defense of Ma Bell.
There are multiple email providers. There are multiple phone providers. You want to argue this is a duopoly? Ok. But it is demonstrably not a monopoly.
Chrome‘s market share is on par with 90s windows. Google search is above that. G-apps on android is on par with ma bell.
Monopolists of the past are jealous of how many monopolies google is getting away with.
Google abuses these positions to decide what web technologies the web uses, which businesses get found on the web and which don’t, and how android device manufacturers build their phones.
Monopolists of the past are jealous of how many monopolies google is getting away with.
Google abuses these positions to decide what web technologies the web uses, which businesses get found on the web and which don’t, and how android device manufacturers build their phones.
You might be fine now, but what if you want to open a physical store/restaurant/etc next year? If you're banned from Google, you'd have no control over your business profile on Google, can't respond to reviews, can't update your store hours and other details, can't advertise on maps, etc.
You probably don't get by without it entirely. Set up a DNS black hole for all of TLS's TLDs, and watch your local network collapse.
(Having said that, I more-or-less never log into my google account, and also don't intentionally use any of their services.)
(Having said that, I more-or-less never log into my google account, and also don't intentionally use any of their services.)
> ...for all of TLS's TLDs,...
Curious what you meant by that? Which TLDs are that and why would my local network collapse?
Curious what you meant by that? Which TLDs are that and why would my local network collapse?
My keyboard autocorrected Google to TLS. Huh.
Not everyone used windows in 1994, either. What they both have/had are significant market shares in certain markets that they abuse to maintain control.
Yes, this is true. I never knew doing a chargeback against the Google Store would get your email account banned.
Google can do what it wants, I just wanted to let people know so they think twice before doing a chargeback against Google.
Google can do what it wants, I just wanted to let people know so they think twice before doing a chargeback against Google.
It's definitely surprising. Chargebacks cause additional issues for a company which is why they're treated more severely than something like a late payment, refunds, etc.
It seems like a lot of folks are surprised by a chargeback causing a loss of access to the company services so wanted to share my experience that this is not abnormal. Big companies tend to do this.
It seems like a lot of folks are surprised by a chargeback causing a loss of access to the company services so wanted to share my experience that this is not abnormal. Big companies tend to do this.
Chargebacks get you banned from pretty much every single company/service.
Your Google Store account IS the some account as your email account.
Sure, we get this. That's not the issue.
The issue is Google told them to issue a chargeback to get his money back. That was Google's representative saying this.
The issue is Google told them to issue a chargeback to get his money back. That was Google's representative saying this.
I had to return a new DOA phone once to Google Fi; despite having a tracking number, and being delivered back to them on the final return window day, they still charged me full new price for my used-replacement phone, after the return was already delivered.
Dealing with support was near impossible, no one had power to override the order, until finally I said I'd chargeback, then they were suddenly able to cancel it...
Obviously I'd never actually charge back though, as shown here, I assumed I'd get the boot
Dealing with support was near impossible, no one had power to override the order, until finally I said I'd chargeback, then they were suddenly able to cancel it...
Obviously I'd never actually charge back though, as shown here, I assumed I'd get the boot
This also happens with Amazon, FWIW. We were doing a reconciliation on our credit card statements and saw some charges from Amazon that didn't correspond to anything in our order history, for like $30 or so. (Amazon charges as it ships, so in large orders where not all items ship together you can be charged random amounts). We ended up charging them back.
Amazon nuked my account. I've been an Amazon customer since the beginning, almost 30 years, and have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars with them. For this $30 chargeback, they yanked back all of my Kindle books, Amazon Prime movie purchases, etc.
I got shifted from the normally incredibly helpful and friendly Amazon Customer Support to one hosted in the Upside-Down and manned by an army of demogorgons. They were essentially debt collectors, and had the attitude to match. Zero understanding or empathy. Incredibly aggressive, unpleasant, and unhelpful. I ended up reversing the chargeback, which of course took two weeks, and it worked itself out in the end.
But wow, customer LTV the size of mine could have been blown up for such a small thing. Seems like someone isn't doing the math inside Amazon.
Amazon nuked my account. I've been an Amazon customer since the beginning, almost 30 years, and have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars with them. For this $30 chargeback, they yanked back all of my Kindle books, Amazon Prime movie purchases, etc.
I got shifted from the normally incredibly helpful and friendly Amazon Customer Support to one hosted in the Upside-Down and manned by an army of demogorgons. They were essentially debt collectors, and had the attitude to match. Zero understanding or empathy. Incredibly aggressive, unpleasant, and unhelpful. I ended up reversing the chargeback, which of course took two weeks, and it worked itself out in the end.
But wow, customer LTV the size of mine could have been blown up for such a small thing. Seems like someone isn't doing the math inside Amazon.
Did you move your spending elsewhere? If not then their math worked correctly.
I think we need to be principled when dealing with companies. This is the only way to make them behave as they should.
I think we need to be principled when dealing with companies. This is the only way to make them behave as they should.
That's the core idea of capitalism. Punish the bad companies. Reward the good companies. Your definition of good is whatever it is. And the system adjusts over time.
Products and services will improve at the learning rate that the market imposes.
Products and services will improve at the learning rate that the market imposes.
So many posts here about how this is expected and normal behaviour by a company to react to a chargeback in this way.
But it’s different when it’s a company that provides your email, your browser, your phone, your entertainment, your car interface, your telecom, your operating systems, your office productivity suite, your online storage solution, and your method of communicating with your friends and family.
I’m not going to blame the victim, but encourage future victims to stop using Google products whenever possible.
But it’s different when it’s a company that provides your email, your browser, your phone, your entertainment, your car interface, your telecom, your operating systems, your office productivity suite, your online storage solution, and your method of communicating with your friends and family.
I’m not going to blame the victim, but encourage future victims to stop using Google products whenever possible.
Losing my google account has to be a worst nightmare scenario. I've started disentangling slowly, starting with mail, but Google Photos is just so convenient.
I ordered a Chromecast on the Google store a couple years back and the item never came. Google wouldn’t refund or reship and I was so close to doing a chargeback, but 20 wasn’t worth the trouble. I’m so glad I didn’t. Now I know to buy Google products from elsewhere and slowly migrate away from Gmail.
This feels like a huge gap in consumer protections. Retaliatory account bans seem like they should not be legal when a retailer fails to deliver. Of course this is all exacerbated by how large the entities in question are and how the same account may govern access to multiple services.
I feel like this is treating the symptoms rather than the cause. Companies shouldn’t be allowed to have such a tight grip on a consumer’s digital life such that an account ban is crippling.
They're both problems. Smaller companies shouldn't be able to retaliate against a valid chargeback either.
Should they be able to retaliate against an invalid chargeback? Chargeback fraud is a thing.
Sure!
But only if they have reasonable system for telling the difference.
But only if they have reasonable system for telling the difference.
Everyone thinks their system is reasonable, that's the whole problem. Banks obviously don't think chargeback fraud is fraud when they perform fraudulent chargebacks. They think they're reasonably legit, which is why they perform them. Retailers also think their fraud prevention systems are reasonable. Reasonable means different things to different people and it certainly doesn't mean infallible.
Nobody in any of these situations thinks they are being unreasonable.
Nobody in any of these situations thinks they are being unreasonable.
> Everyone thinks their system is reasonable
Okay? I didn't say they get to choose. Was the implication of "shouldn't be able" not clear enough? You'd have externally imposed rules.
And in this case google hasn't expressed that they think the process was reasonable, they're just refusing to do anything.
Okay? I didn't say they get to choose. Was the implication of "shouldn't be able" not clear enough? You'd have externally imposed rules.
And in this case google hasn't expressed that they think the process was reasonable, they're just refusing to do anything.
[deleted]
Agreed.
Steam froze my account to punish a PayPal dispute, the amount they would not refund was ~£2. Their refusal was contrary to UK law.
Small story about Steam. They sold me a broken game, in UK one can return broken things according to the Consumer Rights Act, specifically including digital goods. Steam said, at length, they would not refund me: the game would crash (losing some settings) after ~30 minutes, I spent more than 2h of playtime trying to fix it [it's a 50h+ game, I'd have accepted an 8p reduction in my refund!].
I complained to PayPal. PayPal decided in my favour -- ie in keeping with UK law. Steam didn't dispute PayPal's findings but instead froze my Steam account (and I assume paid PayPal the money back). PayPal made me whole, financially.
My Steam account was blocked for a month or so. Ongoing they "punish" me by making it hard for me to give them money -- which is good for me, but my kids are not keen!
WhyTF would I complain over a few £. It's the principle, clearly.
It was very interesting to me to see how a big company can ignore the law in this way. But also spend what must amount to quite a bit of customer service time just to avoid a minimal refund.
All I wanted was a refund for a game Steam sold, that was broken and wouldn't be fixed. I did cursory searching for bugs before buying, but hadn't found this particular one before my purchase.
You know what I did with the refund money, bought the next game in the same series, because it was only the bug that I didn't like, and I paid more money for it than the game they wouldn't refund ... mad, eh!
Steam froze my account to punish a PayPal dispute, the amount they would not refund was ~£2. Their refusal was contrary to UK law.
Small story about Steam. They sold me a broken game, in UK one can return broken things according to the Consumer Rights Act, specifically including digital goods. Steam said, at length, they would not refund me: the game would crash (losing some settings) after ~30 minutes, I spent more than 2h of playtime trying to fix it [it's a 50h+ game, I'd have accepted an 8p reduction in my refund!].
I complained to PayPal. PayPal decided in my favour -- ie in keeping with UK law. Steam didn't dispute PayPal's findings but instead froze my Steam account (and I assume paid PayPal the money back). PayPal made me whole, financially.
My Steam account was blocked for a month or so. Ongoing they "punish" me by making it hard for me to give them money -- which is good for me, but my kids are not keen!
WhyTF would I complain over a few £. It's the principle, clearly.
It was very interesting to me to see how a big company can ignore the law in this way. But also spend what must amount to quite a bit of customer service time just to avoid a minimal refund.
All I wanted was a refund for a game Steam sold, that was broken and wouldn't be fixed. I did cursory searching for bugs before buying, but hadn't found this particular one before my purchase.
You know what I did with the refund money, bought the next game in the same series, because it was only the bug that I didn't like, and I paid more money for it than the game they wouldn't refund ... mad, eh!
I'd love to see a thorough guide on removing one's reliance on Google products/services.
I much prefer Android over iOS, but the fear of Google just being able to completely shut me off on a whim keeps me up at night and is seriously tempting me to switch. I pay Google for Fi, Pixel phones, Home/Nest devices, One Storage for Photos/Gmail/Drive, YouTube Music, and probably some other stuff. My company pays Google for Google Workspace and their 30% IAP tax.
Despite being a paying customer, I know that there's a pretty decent chance of all of that getting shut down with absolutely no recourse for no reasonable cause. It's clear the bad PR from this isn't enough to make Google care. At this point, there needs to be regulatory pressure to stop the casual cruelty.
I much prefer Android over iOS, but the fear of Google just being able to completely shut me off on a whim keeps me up at night and is seriously tempting me to switch. I pay Google for Fi, Pixel phones, Home/Nest devices, One Storage for Photos/Gmail/Drive, YouTube Music, and probably some other stuff. My company pays Google for Google Workspace and their 30% IAP tax.
Despite being a paying customer, I know that there's a pretty decent chance of all of that getting shut down with absolutely no recourse for no reasonable cause. It's clear the bad PR from this isn't enough to make Google care. At this point, there needs to be regulatory pressure to stop the casual cruelty.
This seems like a good starting point: https://github.com/tycrek/degoogle
I’d recommend taking a few steps before doing a chargeback in cases like this:
1. Search around for back channel support. Google things like “executive customer support”. Often times these emails get published by bloggers, forums, etc.
You can also look up support VP /Director’s names and then guess their email (e.g. [email protected]) and tell them your story.
2. Send a signature-required letter detailing out the issue, steps taken, and your requested resolution
These two steps get you significantly closer to having a person who can actually solve your problem actually look into the issue.
1. Search around for back channel support. Google things like “executive customer support”. Often times these emails get published by bloggers, forums, etc.
You can also look up support VP /Director’s names and then guess their email (e.g. [email protected]) and tell them your story.
2. Send a signature-required letter detailing out the issue, steps taken, and your requested resolution
These two steps get you significantly closer to having a person who can actually solve your problem actually look into the issue.
Why should we have to work so hard to get decent support?
It would make more sense to first back up all your stuff switch all accounts to the new email address, set up email forwarding for a month, and then issue the chargeback. From what you are saying this is actually an easier process and unlike your suggestion will surely succeed 100% of the time. Then you aren't anyone's hostage.
Another depending on your jurisdiction is the court process in your area.
In the U.K. we have the Money claim online service, to start proceedings against a company or person who owe money. There is a nominal fee starting at £30 and if companies don’t respond the court will de facto rule in your favour.
In the U.K. we have the Money claim online service, to start proceedings against a company or person who owe money. There is a nominal fee starting at £30 and if companies don’t respond the court will de facto rule in your favour.
That might work to get your money back, but I'll bet Google also has a policy of firing customers who take them to court.
Seems like a plausible denial-of-service attack vector, if you really want to ruin someone's day (or worse) and can hack their credit card account.
Sounds like people should avoid paying google for anything if they rely on the google ecosystem
This is really scary. I've always been a big fan of Google's products despite their issues, and losing an account would probably be 100x worse than losing all important documents at once.
Unfortunately there's no real alternative to Google with full parity, aside from other proprietary platforms that have major downsides like Apple's high cost and incompatibility.
There are open source voice assistants, but not every service supports them. And the things the do support might not have whatever crazy optimization Google does to make Keep load instantly from the widget.
There are other email providers, but few free ones I would trust more than Google, small companies disappear all the time, and Google has a relatively good record of avoiding data breaches.
Nobody except Google provides the APIs Android apps use, probably 60% of the usefulness of my phone would go away without their services, I would guess.
Chrome could be taken over by the FOSS community if need be, although they have a habit of ripping out features so you might as well just use FF.
There's alternatives for finding lost phones and recording location history... but what's the battery life like, and do they have the ability to remote lock a phone?
I'm not sure how anyone would get away from Google without losing a lot. It doesn't seem like anyone but Apple has anywhere near that kind of integration platform.
And the FOSS community seems to have little interest in duplicating the things that make Google what it is.
Google provides dozens of minor conveniences that would be questionably worth it if you had to set them up individually, and definitely not worth it if they were even slightly worse implemented.
It's extra concerning since a Pixel is high on my list for my next phone.
Unfortunately there's no real alternative to Google with full parity, aside from other proprietary platforms that have major downsides like Apple's high cost and incompatibility.
There are open source voice assistants, but not every service supports them. And the things the do support might not have whatever crazy optimization Google does to make Keep load instantly from the widget.
There are other email providers, but few free ones I would trust more than Google, small companies disappear all the time, and Google has a relatively good record of avoiding data breaches.
Nobody except Google provides the APIs Android apps use, probably 60% of the usefulness of my phone would go away without their services, I would guess.
Chrome could be taken over by the FOSS community if need be, although they have a habit of ripping out features so you might as well just use FF.
There's alternatives for finding lost phones and recording location history... but what's the battery life like, and do they have the ability to remote lock a phone?
I'm not sure how anyone would get away from Google without losing a lot. It doesn't seem like anyone but Apple has anywhere near that kind of integration platform.
And the FOSS community seems to have little interest in duplicating the things that make Google what it is.
Google provides dozens of minor conveniences that would be questionably worth it if you had to set them up individually, and definitely not worth it if they were even slightly worse implemented.
It's extra concerning since a Pixel is high on my list for my next phone.
You can notify the CFPB and the FTC, these are US federal consumer protection agencies, they can strongarm companies into your form of compliance.
The EU has some institutions showing muscle too.
Big states like California can also do similar.
But don't forget Delaware, their agencies may not get a lot of attention but they have leverage due to the commonality of companies incorporating there.
Same for Cayman Islands.
The EU has some institutions showing muscle too.
Big states like California can also do similar.
But don't forget Delaware, their agencies may not get a lot of attention but they have leverage due to the commonality of companies incorporating there.
Same for Cayman Islands.
So I placed an order for a MBP 16" from Apple around Black Friday and UPS lost my package during transit. It was not lost after delivery. It's been over two weeks going between Apple's support team and UPS.
UPS tells me to file a claim on their website and they can't address this through phone support, but they closed my case. Apple tells me they are waiting for UPS to respond to them before they can refund my order.
I'm not getting anywhere from either party. My only recourse seems to file a dispute so I can get my money back to place a replacement order, but being blacklisted by Apple is exactly what I fear.
If anyone has any thoughts, please let me know. I'd expect a company like Apple to have a better policy for replacing lost computers. While I understand fraud, I've made numerous purchases in the past with the same account.
UPS tells me to file a claim on their website and they can't address this through phone support, but they closed my case. Apple tells me they are waiting for UPS to respond to them before they can refund my order.
I'm not getting anywhere from either party. My only recourse seems to file a dispute so I can get my money back to place a replacement order, but being blacklisted by Apple is exactly what I fear.
If anyone has any thoughts, please let me know. I'd expect a company like Apple to have a better policy for replacing lost computers. While I understand fraud, I've made numerous purchases in the past with the same account.
Hopefully governments are looking into these customer service (or lack there of) for big tech. Google services are almost as important as banking or telcos for many people so there should be also some oversight here.
(Disclaimer: I’m a employee of one of Googles peer companies, but still only speaking for myself)
(Disclaimer: I’m a employee of one of Googles peer companies, but still only speaking for myself)
I don't usually stick my neck out for Google, but I kinda get this policy. Charge-backs are the "nuclear" option, and both parties will take this unkindly. I understand in this case, it was suggested by the customer rep, which was a mistake.
Also it is wrong tool for other than actually fraudulent as in stolen cc details. Sadly the expensive way is court or arbitration. I wish there was some reasonable method like insurance I could buy that would fight for me instead in these cases.
I was worried about this and this is why I let Google charge me $300+ for some ads I didn't want ran.
I ran a hemp business from 2018 to 2020. I had Google ads going in 2018 but then the ads got taken down because I was using some banned words. I forgot about the ads and never deleted them. They were disabled so I thought that was good enough. Sometime in 2020, after I had gone out of business, I was charged for some ads that ran. Google's policy on CBD ads had changed and they started showing my ads again. I couldn't figure out how to contact a human and I didn't want my account banned so I didn't do a chargeback.
I ran a hemp business from 2018 to 2020. I had Google ads going in 2018 but then the ads got taken down because I was using some banned words. I forgot about the ads and never deleted them. They were disabled so I thought that was good enough. Sometime in 2020, after I had gone out of business, I was charged for some ads that ran. Google's policy on CBD ads had changed and they started showing my ads again. I couldn't figure out how to contact a human and I didn't want my account banned so I didn't do a chargeback.
I placed my first-ever order on the Google store last year for a Pixel phone. Then a FedEx employee left a voicemail asking suspicious questions about my package. Then my phone went missing. FedEx later said they had no record of an employee calling me and would "investigate". It took two weeks of relentlessly following up to get a replacement. FedEx was never able to locate my stolen/missing phone. Never order directly from Google and avoid FedEx at all costs.
Certainly makes me want to look for ways to get away from Google.
It's not only Google. Same thing happened to us with Hertz (car rental). We rented a card when we got home we found extra charges on our card. Contacted Hertz and fell into the black hole of customer support. After a month or so gave up and issued a chargeback. Went to rent a car again a few months later only to find out we're black listed.
I wouldn't be surprised if it's standard practice at a lot of companies to black list you if you make a chargeback.
I wouldn't be surprised if it's standard practice at a lot of companies to black list you if you make a chargeback.
That's an interesting coincidence. I have been pondering whether to do a chargeback on a food order that Deliveroo failed to deliver. The support refused to refund until I told them I would do a chargeback. I was wondering what the consequences of doing the chargeback would be, but if even the threat of performing one changes their stance on a refund I guess it can't be that bad.
Complaining on twitter seems to make get them to refund.
I thought all companies are doing that by default?
I haven't heard that. I can see two perspectives:
1. If a chargeback is issued, that means the company messed up massively and they should investigate, not ban the user
2. Some people fraudulently issue chargebacks and we assume our support would solve all legitimate issues, therefore it's a ban.
Probably the answer is to use risk signals about users to inform an investigation.
1. If a chargeback is issued, that means the company messed up massively and they should investigate, not ban the user
2. Some people fraudulently issue chargebacks and we assume our support would solve all legitimate issues, therefore it's a ban.
Probably the answer is to use risk signals about users to inform an investigation.
in this case google support recomended the writer issue a chargeback when their policy was to ban all accounts who issue chargebacks
yeah i'm going avoid buying anything directly from google
yeah i'm going avoid buying anything directly from google
Your point 1 isn't really true. People charge back businesses all the time for any reason up to and including "I don't want to pay for this and this is how I don't have to". It's a huge problem for folks like eBay sellers, for example.
Neither point is reliably true. They are the extremes of a spectrum.
Exactly. It would have been clearer if I had added "in the middle:" after "the answer is".
Many do, but I would just assume they ban the user from buying more items from the Google Store instead of banning his whole email account.
Yes - they do.
In general companies will disable the account and the amount might be sold to collection agency (so you will receive unpleasant news when apply for mortgage or something like that).
But majority of companies do email you and do have email address for support so I never run into issues like this.
In general companies will disable the account and the amount might be sold to collection agency (so you will receive unpleasant news when apply for mortgage or something like that).
But majority of companies do email you and do have email address for support so I never run into issues like this.
This is off-topic, but I tried canceling my Google services subscription for a domain I no longer owned, and was unable to. There was no way to contact google, and they kept charging me. I ended up asking AmEx to delete the charges, and they did. Still nothing from Google, other than requests to pay them for no service provided.
I really wish they had someone I could call.
I really wish they had someone I could call.
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> Bought two phones by accident, returned one of them, package was lost and a representative told me to do a chargeback if I wanted my money back. Did that, Google account got banned.
I don't believe|understand this.
Why would Google ban someone's account just because of this? A Google account is a personal thing, and this is about logistics.
I don't believe|understand this.
Why would Google ban someone's account just because of this? A Google account is a personal thing, and this is about logistics.
I have a 13 year old Google account. I only added a credit card couple of months back to help out a friend because his Gapps access was blocked. My new year resolution is to find an alternative to Gapps so that I don't have to do "business" with Google on my or anyone else's behalf.
This is more common than people know I think. Issuing chargeback is a great way to get dropped as a customer.
Because of stories like this, I use my primary google account just for gmail, which is for official communication and identity only basically. I would not set my credit card there, neither I use it for GCP nor Android.
Every service does this. If you chargeback usually you will get banned. You should always get a refund by talking to support. Chargebacks cost the company extra fees and can lead to problems if they get too many.
> You should always get a refund by talking to support
In the original post, the author had multiple conversations with support, and the support agent told them to do a chargeback. And another support agent later acknowledged that the support agent was not supposed to say that, but that the ban remains in place regardless.
In the original post, the author had multiple conversations with support, and the support agent told them to do a chargeback. And another support agent later acknowledged that the support agent was not supposed to say that, but that the ban remains in place regardless.
I entirely disagree. I bet very few companies wouldn’t undo a similar ban when the company itself recommended the chargeback.
Does anyone know if google ban your account but you have email forwarding enabled on gmail, will it continue to forward emails to another external account (even temporarily)?
I bought some stuff yesterday on Hearthstone via google, payment got out never got my stuff. Was exactly afraid of that, wont risk it for $10, but also will never buy again
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Good, and as expected.
This is completely normal for companies to do this and there is a 99% chance that doing a chargeback will get your account immediately terminated.
You cannot have it both ways with chargebacks and keeping your account as I have said before [0] as it is rife with abuse and friendly fraud and the merchant reserves the right to suspend, terminate and ban your account if you do so as per their ToS.
So this is of course hardly a surprise here.
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32173942
This is completely normal for companies to do this and there is a 99% chance that doing a chargeback will get your account immediately terminated.
You cannot have it both ways with chargebacks and keeping your account as I have said before [0] as it is rife with abuse and friendly fraud and the merchant reserves the right to suspend, terminate and ban your account if you do so as per their ToS.
So this is of course hardly a surprise here.
[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32173942
I think the difference here is that the OP of that post claims the representative told him to chargeback as the resolution to his issue. In their position, I would've probably done the same.
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I did a chargeback against Google as they wouldn’t refund fraudulent Adsense charges. My account didn’t get banned.
5 years from now, some engineer will probably say "oh, the adsense billing chargeback processing system seems to have been stuck for years, and the workqueue is overflowing. Lets restart it and let it work through the backlog.". Then bam, your account is gone.
Ugh I hope not. But that is incentive to migrate away from google serivces.
Amazon has a lot of problems, but at least you can talk to actual humans who speak fucking english.
I wonder if they are still liable to hand out your data to you under EU data protection laws.
What's the best email alternative to gmail?
I’ve used Fastmail for…two decades? Some very long period of time. Very happy, although I don’t use Gmail so I can’t compare features.
There are a lot of 3rd party ones: Protonmail, Hey, even Gandi has a service. Getting "free" email is, I think, a thing of the past. You want to be a customer, not a product.
I run my own email, but getting delivery can be a pain, so I also use Mailgun as an SMTP relay. It's worth paying them for this service.
I run my own email, but getting delivery can be a pain, so I also use Mailgun as an SMTP relay. It's worth paying them for this service.
If you don't mind paying a bit and only need a few accounts, AWS Workmail is actually pretty decent. I use my own domain for it as well (also managed thru AWS). I've been using this setup for ~4 years now.
Has this actually happened to others as well? With Google in particular?
edit I think dang's post kind of declares what I was implying with my question.
edit I think dang's post kind of declares what I was implying with my question.
This is the kind of spiteful behaviour I’d expect from someone like Elon Musk…
“Oh you think you can do a chargeback on us?!… We will fu#king destroy you at the touch of a button. We are untouchable. We are Google motherf#ker!”
“Oh you think you can do a chargeback on us?!… We will fu#king destroy you at the touch of a button. We are untouchable. We are Google motherf#ker!”
.. glad I ditched those socio/psycopaths ages ago.
A chargeback can be initiated for any number of reasons.. It's good business practice to disable the account of someone claiming fraud, to prevent more fraud.. :D
You're right, a company cannot commit fraud if they have no one to commit fraud against.
Presumably not permanently.
Of course permanently. But what’s unacceptable here is canceling the email account too.
> Of course permanently.
Not if your motivation is avoiding the fraud the user just told you about. You'd investigate more.
Definitely not "of course".
Not if your motivation is avoiding the fraud the user just told you about. You'd investigate more.
Definitely not "of course".
It still makes sense to ban, for the same reason insurance premiums go up even if your claim is no-fault. Your marginal value as a user is less than the cost of a single chargeback, ergo ban.
In fact it is doing all three things we ask people not to do: it's editorialized, it's linkbait (sensational/indignant), and it's arguably misleading because it's making a general claim while the linked article is the narration of (one side of) one example—and note that its title never claims to be otherwise. When a HN title is more linkbait, more misleading, and more editorialized than the corresponding title on Reddit, that's probably a bad sign.
More generally, I don't think a $BigCo horror story on Reddit is likely to be much of a basis for a substantive HN discussion. There just isn't enough information—all it will do is evoke people's pre-existing opinions and judgments (not to mention indignation). The comments will be generic and repetitive of previous discussions in the same bucket. This is mostly what we're trying to avoid on HN.
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