Google myBusiness fails again!
I was notified by a colleague that one of our business listings on Google was showing the wrong address. When I checked, it was indeed incorrect; the address had been changed to a random apartment in a community 91 miles away. I did not receive any notification, despite being a claimed business, that the information had been updated. Clearly, the “Suggest an edit” feature is not working as intended. Business owners should have the opportunity to review and reject any suggestions before going live.
In an effort to correct this information, I logged into my work Google account and changed the address back to the correct address. Immediately, I received a notification that my business listing had been suspended due to “deceptive content.” Of course, I’m like “what the actual fuck”, Google literally allowed the address to be changed by a random person to a specific unit in another apartment community in a different city, but I am unable to change it back without getting the business listing suspended.
Now, I am annoyed because I have to deal with this stupidity instead of doing the work I had planned for this day. I filed an appeal, and I literally used Google’s own Maps and Street View platform to prove that their AI’s decision was completely incorrect, especially given that we have maintained this listing for more than a decade. The address had remained the same until recently, but I guess Google’s AI thought we had physically moved the building 91 miles. This is why I am very sceptical of using AI for automation.
Anyway, 3 days later, I got an email telling me the appeal had been successful, and that the property’s GMB listing would be back online within 24 hours. If I can use their own Maps and Street View products to generate evidence that they accepted, why couldn’t the AI have done the same to confirm that the random address change was false, and, of course, that the account manager changing it back was legitimate? And I said as much in the appeal message to Google, berating them for wasting my time.