Why is my Google Merchant Center account suspended?

Merchant Center holds the products your Shopping and Performance Max campaigns advertise, and Google reviews each account against its policies for Shopping ads and free listings. A product that breaks one can be disapproved. Google says repeated or severe violations can lead to a suspension of the whole account, and while it lasts, the account’s products are disabled from Shopping surfaces.

Most violations bring a warning first. Google emails what it found, how to fix it and the days you have, 7 or 28 calendar days. During the warning your products may keep showing, with limited visibility. Remove the products that break the policy in that time and Google reviews the account at the end of the period by itself, with nothing to request. If the period ends with the issue still there, the account may be suspended.

Some come with no warning. Google calls some violations egregious, so serious that they’re unlawful or pose significant harm to users, and suspends an account for them on detection. Three parts of its Misrepresentation policy are among them.

Google names the common reasons for a warning or a suspension:

• A missing return and refund policy. Your site needs one that says how you handle returns and refunds, with any requirements and timelines. If you don’t accept returns, it says so.
• Too little contact information. Your legal business name, physical address, phone number and email address, clearly listed on your site and the same as in your Merchant Center settings.
• Misrepresentation of yourself or your products, below. Google reads a Website needs improvement issue the same way: both ask for an audit of the site.

One more status stops a review before it starts: Linked account suspension. It means a suspended Google Ads account is linked to your Merchant Center account, and the Google Ads suspension has to be fixed, by appeal, before Google will review the Merchant Center one. Unlinking the Google Ads account doesn’t lift the Merchant Center suspension.

Google’s Misrepresentation policy is about listings and sites that mislead: an offer that asks for a purchase before giving all the relevant information and getting the customer’s explicit consent, and one that presents you or your products in a way that isn’t accurate, realistic and truthful. Its parts are enforced differently.

• Suspended on detection, with no warning: unacceptable business practices, such as a false identity, business name or contact details, hiding where the business or its fulfilment really is, or refusing a refund your own policy allows; coordinated deceptive practices; and dishonest pricing and transaction conditions, such as a total price without its taxes and fees, shipping or return costs left out, or a handling delay hidden behind a quoted delivery time. Google says an account suspended for these isn’t allowed to list again, and is reinstated only in compelling circumstances.
• A warning at least 7 days before any suspension: unavailable offers, such as items listed that you can’t fulfil or a ship-from location hidden to look local; manipulated media; and unreliable claims.

Before asking for a review, Google asks for an audit of the site and the account, and lists what to check:

• The same business name, address, phone number and email on your site, in Merchant Center and in your payment profile.
• Links to your shipping, return and refund, and privacy policies, with your contact details and shipping and return terms easy to reach from the site’s footer.
• Prices and availability in your product data exactly as on your product pages.
• No placeholder text or broken links, and a checkout that works, over HTTPS.
• Identity verification in Merchant Center, where it asks for it, with documents that match the account’s details.

Google says it in several places:

1. 01Read the emails from Google: a suspension sends a series of them with the policy it found broken.
2. 02In Merchant Center, an issue with the whole account shows in a banner at the top of the page, and on the Home page.
3. 03Go to Products › Needs attention. The cards at the top hold the issues with the most impact, account-level ones included. Select View setup and policy issues for all of the account’s, with the end of any cool-down.
4. 04In Google Ads, go to Campaigns › Recommendations. Google raises Fix Merchant Center account suspension for a suspended account and Prevent Merchant Center account suspension for one at risk.

A review is asked for in Merchant Center, once the issue is fixed:

1. 01Fix everything the issue names, and audit the rest of the site against the list above.
2. 02Complete identity verification if Needs attention asks for it; the review button stays off until you do. It also needs at least one product in your product data: if a source is empty, add one under Products › All products.
3. 03Go to Products › Needs attention, select View setup and policy issues, then I fixed the issue, or I disagree with the issue if you believe Google is wrong, and Request review. Review and fix on the Home page, Fix on the banner and Request review in the Diagnostics tab are other ways in.

Google says a review can take up to 7 business days, and emails you when you request it and when it’s done. Your ads may not show while it runs. If your products come from Shopify’s Google & YouTube app, request it there: the Settings tab, then Request re-review.

Reviews are limited. Google says you may only have one chance to disagree with the issue, and that a one-week cool-down may begin if the issue isn’t resolved by the second review attempt. During a cool-down the review button is greyed out and the account stays suspended; each unsuccessful review after it can make the next one longer, and Google’s support can’t shorten it. Ask when everything is fixed, not to find out what’s wrong.

Shopping campaigns stop. Google says a Shopping campaign can’t serve until the Merchant Center account’s issues are resolved, so a Standard Shopping campaign using the suspended account shows no ads.

Performance Max loses its product ads. Its ads that use product data include Shopping ads on Google Search, YouTube search, Maps and search partners, and dynamic remarketing on the Display Network, and they draw on the same products. To see what the campaign can still show, go to Campaigns › Insights and reports › Channel performance: the Status column says, channel by channel, whether it can show ads, and its diagnostics name a Merchant Center account that’s suspended or at risk of suspension among the product feed issues.

Whatever keeps running is the campaign’s whole result until the products are back, so read its spend and conversions since the suspension on their own before leaving its budget and target as they were.

An account in good standing can still have products that don’t show: disapproved one by one, or limited for their data, such as a missing identifier or a product page Google can’t reach.

1. 01In Google Ads, go to Campaigns › Products › Products with a Shopping or Performance Max campaign chosen in the filters, and read the Product status and Issues columns.
2. 02In Merchant Center, Products › Needs attention lists every product with an issue and what needs attention. Fix the product data: Google reviews an edited product again by itself.

A campaign with no products at all shows no Shopping ads whatever its budget. Google raises Add products to your Shopping campaigns for it on the Recommendations page. It has none to show when Merchant Center has no products for it or none with the campaign’s feed label, or when the campaign’s inventory filter or listing groups leave every one out. Google’s troubleshooting page adds listing groups that no longer match your product data, and product data not refreshed for 30 days, which expires.

Every day Goldbeater reads Google’s own recommendations for your account and the products that showed in your ads over the last 30 days, and raises:

• A Merchant Center account suspended, or warned it may be: high when suspended, and a warning medium where its products carry at least a thousandth of the account’s spend. It says what the account’s products spent in your ads and brought, and where in Merchant Center the issue is and the review is requested.
• Products Merchant Center keeps out of your ads, or limits: products that showed in the last 30 days and are in stock, one finding for each issue Merchant Center reports, its products in a table. Keeping out products that converted or spent $200 is high.
• A campaign with no products to advertise: an enabled Shopping or Performance Max campaign Google asks to add products to, with its reason: Merchant Center has none for it, none with its feed label, or its filters or listing groups leave every one out.

An account’s standing is Merchant Center’s to restore, so the finding is the work before the review: which account, what it was worth to your ads, and where the issue and the review button are.

The audit checklist has every Shopping line with where to find it in Google Ads.

How long does a Merchant Center review take?

Google says up to 7 business days, and emails you when you request it and when it’s done. Your ads may not show while it runs.

Do my Shopping ads stop while Merchant Center is suspended?

Yes. A suspension disables the account’s products from Shopping surfaces, and Google says a Shopping campaign can’t serve until the account’s issues are resolved. In Performance Max, the ads that use product data draw on the same products.

What’s the difference between a warning and a suspension?

A warning gives you a date, 7 or 28 days away for most violations, and your products may keep showing with limited visibility until then. A suspension takes them off Shopping ads and free listings until a review reinstates the account.

Why is the Request review button greyed out?

A cool-down after reviews that didn’t clear the issue greys it out, and Needs attention shows when it ends. The button also waits for identity verification, where Google asks for it, and for at least one product in your product data.

Can a suspension for misrepresentation be lifted?

Where you can fix what Google found, yes: when a review succeeds, Google approves the account and allows its products to show again. For the parts of the policy it calls egregious, such as a false identity or dishonest pricing, it says an account is reinstated only in compelling circumstances.