Merchant Center Suspended
or Products Disapproved?

Work out first whether it's the whole account or individual products, because the fixes are different. Account suspensions are usually about trust: contact details, policies, checkout and business information that don't add up. Product disapprovals are usually data: prices, stock, shipping, images or GTINs that don't match your website.

Fix everything you can find before you request a review. Google gives you limited goes, and each failed review can lead to a longer cool-down where the button is greyed out and support can't help. A rushed appeal is the most common way a two-week problem becomes a two-month one.

Product disapprovals hit individual items. The rest of your catalogue keeps showing. They're the most common and the easiest to fix.

Account warnings come by email with a deadline. Products keep showing, sometimes with reduced visibility, until it passes. For many policies that's at least seven days. Fix it in time and you avoid a suspension altogether.

Account suspensions stop every product in that country from showing. Some follow a warning that wasn't dealt with. Others arrive without warning, which Google reserves for what it calls egregious issues, and misrepresentation can fall into that bucket.

Everything lives in Merchant Center under Products, then the Needs attention tab. Account-level problems are behind View setup and policy issues, or the banner at the top of the screen. Product problems are listed by issue, with how many items each one affects.

Click into an issue and you'll usually see example products and, for website problems, the exact URL Google checked. Open that URL in a private browser window. It's often obvious straight away: a different price, an out of stock message, a password page.

Start with the issues affecting the most items, because one theme or feed fix can clear hundreds at once. And give it time: the Needs attention tab can lag behind your fixes.

This is the suspension everyone dreads, because Google rarely tells you which part of your site caused it. The policy itself is about trust: is your business who it says it is, and will customers get what they're promised? Google's guidance says accounts suspended for it are only reinstated in compelling circumstances, which is why being thorough beats being quick.

Go through your site as a suspicious customer would. Can you find a real business name, a physical address, a phone number and an email? Do they match what's in Merchant Center, exactly? Are delivery costs and times clear before checkout? Is there a returns and refund policy you'd actually honour? Are there trust badges, "as seen in" logos or reviews you can't back up? Is any page still full of template text?

Then check the claims. "Free next day delivery" that's really three to five days, a sale that never ends, stock you can't fulfil, health claims you can't support. Each one can be enough.

Google requires a way for customers to contact you on your website, and it wants your returns and refunds information findable throughout checkout, alongside your terms and contact details. A contact form on its own is the bare minimum. A footer with your business name, address, phone and email, plus links to delivery, returns, privacy and terms pages, is what it should look like.

Policies also have to agree with each other. A returns page saying 30 days and terms saying 14 is exactly the kind of inconsistency that gets flagged.

Google compares the price and stock in your product data with what it finds on the landing page. If they don't match, the product is disapproved. Usual culprits: a sale live on the site but not in the feed, a discount app changing prices on the page, prices in another currency for visitors outside the UK, or a feed that updates daily while stock changes hourly.

Structured data matters too. Your product pages tell Google the price and availability in code as well as on screen, and if that code is out of date, Google believes the code.

Automatic item updates, a Merchant Center setting, lets Google correct prices and availability from your landing pages. It's a useful safety net, but it hides the underlying problem rather than fixing it. Find out why the feed and the site disagree.

Shipping. Every country you advertise in needs delivery costs and times set up in Merchant Center, and they need to match your checkout. Google's rules say fees beyond government ones should be in your delivery settings, and the price shouldn't jump at checkout. A surprise delivery charge on the last step is a classic cause.

Images. Product images get disapproved for promotional text or badges on top, watermarks, placeholder images, or being too small and blurry. Use a clean product shot. Save the "20% off" for your promotions settings, not the photo.

GTINs. That's the barcode number. If a product has one from the manufacturer, include it, and make sure it's right. Products that have a GTIN but don't submit it can be disapproved. Your own-brand or handmade products usually don't have one, and that's fine: send brand and MPN instead, or tell Google no identifier exists. Never make one up.

These are the Shopify ones that come up again and again.

The store password is still on. If Google's crawler hits a password page, it can't check anything. Take it off before you connect Merchant Center, not after.

Policy pages left as templates. Shopify gives you starter text for refund, privacy and shipping policies. Left half-finished, or contradicting what you actually do, they work against you.

Two apps sending the same products. The Google & YouTube app plus a separate feed app can mean duplicate or conflicting product data. Pick one source.

Barcodes in the wrong field. The app reads GTINs from the barcode field on each variant. SKUs typed into it, or barcodes left blank, cause identifier warnings across the catalogue.

Markets and currency. If visitors from other countries get redirected or see converted prices, Google's crawler can see a different page from the one your feed describes. Check how the product page looks from the country you're advertising in.

Business details out of sync. The store's contact details, the address in Merchant Center and the details on your policy pages should all be the same business, written the same way.

Don't request a review the same day you get suspended. It almost never works, and it uses up a go.

Don't open a new Merchant Center account to get round the suspension. Google treats that as trying to circumvent its systems, and it can make things a lot worse, including for your Google Ads account. And don't pay anyone promising guaranteed reinstatement. Nobody can guarantee it.

If you've been round the loop once already, or you can't see what's wrong, a second pair of eyes helps. I deal with Merchant Center as part of my Google Shopping management, and for Shopify stores as part of Shopify ads. Feed health comes before any bidding.

If you just want someone to have a look, ask for a free 15-minute review. I'll go through your site and Merchant Center issues and send you the top three things I'd fix before asking Google again. No promises about Google's decision, because nobody can make those, but I'll tell you honestly what I'd change.