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Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

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Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#71

Post by quanticle »

zeta0134 wrote: post #8
jonknee wrote: post #2

Google's classic canned response of "We've confirmed we're right, we will not tell you why and this is the last reply you'll receive" is one of the most infuriating things I can imagine. I make my income primarily through AdSense and live in fear of that email one day. In this scenario it seems pretty obvious that their automated fraud AI messed up, but the customer service person is probably also automated. They hav…

This whole practice reeks of being downright fraudulent. Especially with a new technology like Apple Card, which folks will understandably not have a strong familiarity with. I get that Google needs to combat fraud and all that, but they should at least inform the customer of why such a drastic action (a permanent ban! !!) was taken with almost no warning. Really, any respectable company in this situation would simpl…

I think an application of Hanlon's Razor (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon%27s_razor) is applicable here. Google is in an oligopolistic position (along with Facebook) in the online ads space. Therefore, they face zero consequence for having extraordinarily poor customer service. As a result, they optimize their customer "service" to minimize work for themselves.

I ran into a very similar situation with my gas company. I'd fat-fingered my bank account number in their online form, so they weren't able to debit my account. Instead of notifying me of this problem, they simply locked my account and threatened to cut me off for non-payment. Even after I'd called the company and appealed, they still prevented me from paying with my bank account for 12 months and forced me to pay with a credit card (which incurred an additional $3.75 "convenience fee").

Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#72

Post by alanfranz »

weinzierl wrote: post #67
jaclaz wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>so it's legal to discriminate based on it. (And is often done, though not to this extent; many places, for example, will accept Visa and Mastercard but not Discover.) Sure, but one thing is: "Sorry, I cannot accept Discover, do you happen to have another means of payment?" and another one is: "Sorry, I cannot accept Discover, and since you presented one of those cards to me once, then you are prevented for the rest…

From Google's point of view it's more like: "Sorry, I cannot accept this bill, and since you presented counterfeit money to me once, then you are prevented for the rest of your life to enter these premises again". I'm not saying this is right, but I think it's the more apt analogy.

At least there's a reason AND a felony. If a customer steals at my restaurant, that's a good reason to deny him service forever. But I'll probably contact police about it as well.

Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#73

Post by kadoban »

weinzierl wrote: post #67
jaclaz wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>so it's legal to discriminate based on it. (And is often done, though not to this extent; many places, for example, will accept Visa and Mastercard but not Discover.) Sure, but one thing is: "Sorry, I cannot accept Discover, do you happen to have another means of payment?" and another one is: "Sorry, I cannot accept Discover, and since you presented one of those cards to me once, then you are prevented for the rest…

From Google's point of view it's more like: "Sorry, I cannot accept this bill, and since you presented counterfeit money to me once, then you are prevented for the rest of your life to enter these premises again". I'm not saying this is right, but I think it's the more apt analogy.

Except it's in no sense of the word "counterfeit", right? So the analogy falls apart pretty hard for me. It's more like that old Taco Bell $2 bill story.

Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#74

Post by homologate »

hamandcheese wrote: post #6

> All I can say is that it's likely that he was either using a virtual card or his identity was tied to a previously suspended account. > After doing a bit of research, I discovered that the number that is generated in the wallet app (the only way you can get your card number for the Apple Card) is, infact, a virtual card. This seems like the likely cause.

But as stated elsewhere on this post, Google's official policy states that virtual cards are accepted.

https://support.google.com/google-ads/answer/2375433

Credit cards and debit cards -> Make a payment with a one-time use credit card

>In addition to regular credit cards, you can also use a one-time use credit card (also known as virtual credit card). It's commonly used as an alternative to physical credit cards when making online payments.

Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#75

Post by howdisposs45 »

jonknee wrote: post #2

Google's classic canned response of "We've confirmed we're right, we will not tell you why and this is the last reply you'll receive" is one of the most infuriating things I can imagine. I make my income primarily through AdSense and live in fear of that email one day. In this scenario it seems pretty obvious that their automated fraud AI messed up, but the customer service person is probably also automated. They hav…

>in this case people literally trying to give you money!

Gmail for Android has 2 core functions: to send and to receive mail. It fails at one of them. (Emails get stuck in its outbox indefinitely - you can force it to send by going into the "outbox" and dragging down to refresh, which is an action that has no button to show it is possible. There is no notification that your mail wasn't sent.)

Here is a thread about it:

https://support.google.com/mail/thread/3130686?hl=en

How is it possible for an app that has 2 functions, to fail to do one of them?

This is like a salt and pepper set where the pepper side has no holes - the pepper is stuck inside. (You can unscrew the top and manually shake some out though.) Sure salt is more common. But it's literally a salt and pepper set that only functions as a salt shaker.

Gmail for android is literally a mail sending and receiving app that can't send mail.

How can this happen? I mean literally, how is the support thread I linked possible?

If I were the CEO and I saw a thread like that, the issue would be fixed within 7 minutes, as every person within earshot of me rushed to make themselves look good to me.

How is Google's CEO different?

Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#76

Post by trollsund »

zeta0134 wrote: post #8
jonknee wrote: post #2

Google's classic canned response of "We've confirmed we're right, we will not tell you why and this is the last reply you'll receive" is one of the most infuriating things I can imagine. I make my income primarily through AdSense and live in fear of that email one day. In this scenario it seems pretty obvious that their automated fraud AI messed up, but the customer service person is probably also automated. They hav…

This whole practice reeks of being downright fraudulent. Especially with a new technology like Apple Card, which folks will understandably not have a strong familiarity with. I get that Google needs to combat fraud and all that, but they should at least inform the customer of why such a drastic action (a permanent ban! !!) was taken with almost no warning. Really, any respectable company in this situation would simpl…

> Really, any respectable company...

Here's the issue. From my perspective, Google used to be a respectable company, but through automation of customer handling and service they've elected to accept negative consequences and impact for customers - which isn't a very respectable position to take in my book.

Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#77

Post by joncrane »

iampims wrote: post #10
laurentdc wrote: post #5

Why the war on virtual cards? My bank lets me create infinite "throwaway" credit cards that work for a single payment or up to a certain expiry date. They're great for never having to expose your real card number and keeping track of maximum spend. Are these classified as virtual cards? I use them all the time for Facebook ads and was planning to set up a AdWords campaign too, but now I'm worried

Which bank if I may ask?

Capital One definitely does this (I used to work there and when we rolled it out it was considered quite innovative).

Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#78

Post by pb7 »

jonknee wrote: post #51
Godel_unicode wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is that it doesn't break down except in the extreme cases, and even then it's often less bad than the edge cases with traditional human-mediated customer service. Consider the Wells Fargo accounts snafu, or the Comcast customer nickname issue. Or PayPal just in general. Is Google actually worse, or are they the kind of better that makes their rarer screwups seem worse. Consider in your evaluation just how m…

Extreme cases like using a popular new credit card to pay? Please. Google uses an algorithm to ban people for life without recourse, it's insane. Not everything can be reduced to an algo, sometimes you need to make exceptions. It can even make your algo better (thousands of people are going to try using their new Apple cards in the coming weeks).

You don’t have the data to conclude that it doesn’t work well. We could very well be commenting on an exception out of millions of perfectly executed automated fraud detections.

Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#79

Post by Marsymars »

jonknee wrote: post #2

Google's classic canned response of "We've confirmed we're right, we will not tell you why and this is the last reply you'll receive" is one of the most infuriating things I can imagine. I make my income primarily through AdSense and live in fear of that email one day. In this scenario it seems pretty obvious that their automated fraud AI messed up, but the customer service person is probably also automated. They hav…

> Google's classic canned response of "We've confirmed we're right, we will not tell you why and this is the last reply you'll receive" is one of the most infuriating things I can imagine.

For non-negligible damages, heading immediately to small claims court (given you live in a sensible jurisdiction) seems to be the easiest thing in that case. Even if Google's ultimately in the right, they typically can't just ignore that entirely.

From a decade ago:

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/why-i-sued-google-and-won_b_1...

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/why-google-bothered-to-ap_b_2...

Re: Banned from Google Ads for Using Apple Card

#80

Post by GeekyBear »

AceJohnny2 wrote: post #48
GeekyBear wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In your example, the user was easily able to contact a real human being who informed them that their account had been terminated for using a fraudulent gift card. That human being even went to bat for the user and tried to convince corporate that buying the fraudulent gift card had been an honest mistake in trusting the wrong seller and not intentional fraud. This seems like quite a different experience from "you are…

Read on for the salient part. > This Senior Agent #2 was not as supportive as the first, and gave me information that contradicted Senior Agent #1: “Your account has been permanently disabled,” he said. “There is nothing else you can do, there is no escalation path.” > When I asked for an explanation as to why, all he would say is, “See the terms and conditions.” Ultimately, the author was able to get out of that dea…

The salient fact is that the user was easily able to contact customer support, find out exactly what the issue was, provide documentation showing what had happened, and appeal an adverse decision all the way to the top.

This is significantly different than "we won't tell you what the issue is and we won't even accept communications from you".

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