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I have the same problem with Google 2FA.

"We sent a notification to your S21".

No, I'm holding my S21 in my hand, unlocked. About 1/3 of the time, there's no notification. Or it takes five minutes to arrive.

This is only one of many problems I've had with Google recently. I went from haphazardly trying to avoid their products for privacy reasons to now putting max effort into minimizing my Google usage because everything they do is badly broken. I've just spent two weeks getting my business re-listed on Maps after it was flagged for no reason. Impossible to talk to a human. They give you a number to call on every support email, but it's for advertising support who can't do anything about a suspended business account and are very surprised (refuse to believe in fact) that the Google business team gives out their number for support. It took me half an hour of repeating the question in different ways for the Google Ads support woman to admit that there is no way to talk to a human about Google Business.

Bitter? Hell, I'm an anti-Google evangelist now.



> Hell, I'm an anti-Google evangelist now.

Welcome to the club. I still have a gmail I use for some family and old friends, and there's a lot of history there, but I generally avoid using it unless it's a throwaway now. And... when dealing with clients, I suggest alternatives to GA, google maps, etc. Occasionally they override me, but I'm helping to get alternatives out there.

12-15 years ago, I was using google pay/wallet/something to accept payments for some projects. They just... rebadged it, changed the terms, etc. I couldn't even figure out what it was being changed to entirely, but, they seemed to not give a shit about orgs like mine who were trying to use their products to conduct business, so I gave up.

I've told my stories to many folks in person; I'll get "oh, you didn't understand abc.." or "that's never happened to me - you must have done something wrong". About a quarter of those people later indicate to me that... yep... they've been hit by some weird google bug or issue or deprecation or abandonment that cost them time/money with no real support options, and they then take steps to get off the google train.

I know I still have a ways to go to get anything critical to my life out of google's way, but every month I get a bit closer.


> alternatives to GA, google maps

The problem is, as a small brick and mortar business, there is no alternative to Google Maps. I mean, sure. Technically alternatives exist. But if your customers don't use them, they are meaningless.

Of course we are listed on OpenStreetMap. But my guess is that since we opened, the number of customers we got that way rounds to zero.

Meanwhile, we get delisted from Google Maps and our revenue instantly drops about 70% (we are in a tourist area). It sucks. There's nothing we can do about it except make frustrated posts like this.




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