A minor one in this particular case but possible something that’s a wider concern for those of us using our time at the moment to clean up maps a little and enhance listings where possible…
I noted that a business has their map marker in slightly the wrong place yesterday and, as is the norm with the Maps app, I went to the “Suggest an edit” and then “Change name or other details” in the hope of moving the marker. At the time of doing this I noted the “Reopen this place” was also available as shown below.
On choosing “Change name or other details” I was then shown the options to “Re-open” or “Cancel” my planned edit, essentially as if I’d clicked “Reopen this place” in the window above rather than the option I actually went for.
There seems to be no scope for updating the business details in Maps unless I first (incorrectly) re-open it which is obviously something I’m not going to do.
The behaviour is the same in a browser as it is in the app.
So I ask, is this a bug or a by-design feature to prevent updates on listings that are temporarily closed? If it is by design then wouldn’t more appropriate wording be better to prevent any confusion such as “edits to temporarily closed businesses are disabled” or similar?
Like I say this is a minor edit I’m wanting to do, a slight realignment of the marker to put it in exactly the right place, but presumably this inability to edit applies to all temporarily closed businesses even if we’re wanting to add useful information such as the current website, telephone number and so on?
Find a “Temporarily closed” business, try it for yourself, let me know if you see the same.
Thanks @Stranger9 - I had been following that particular topic but hadn’t seen any mention of this particular “feature” as I hadn’t been in there for some time.
If this is the case that it’s “by design” I can’t help thinking that it could have been implemented in a better way but I presume it’s been done like this for a reason, as with many other things I guess we just wait until things are “over” and some normality comes back.
I’m finding all kinds of odd behaviour currently that doesn’t make sense to me but I guess it does to others
I can confirm your observations and I agree that it is far from optimal. Especially, when you consider that we can not just close the place temporarily after making a needed and valid edit to the place. I have often chosen to forget about a needed edit just because a place is temporarily closed.
Indeed @turbotapeworm this is by design. In my view, the biggest problem is the fact that Google marked tons of unclaimed businesses as temporarily closed in some kind of bulk operation, and with a lot of businesses opening again these days they still remain labeled closed on Maps, as the business owner is evidently not aware of this.
On my LG trips these days, one of my main activities is opening businesses again.
I am also facing the same issue while editing the POI currently. I assumed that all the places like School, college, shops, industries, and other misc places (except hospitals and Medical store) are currently marked as Temporary Closed due to Covod19 and lockdown.
Therefore while editing the POI, I am marking the place as Opened currently as POI are being opened slowly.
So it is not a big issue to mark the POI as opened. Please correct me if I have understood something wrong.
As @MortenCopenhagen already said @Sandeepnirvan : please make sure to only mark places as open if you have personal knowledge about the actual situation.
In my country, for example, schools are slowly being opened again, but the final decision about a particular school is made by the local school principal (if he/she is confident enough that this can be done in a safe way). So, there is no way for me to make any changes for schools I am not familiar with from personal experience.
Hi @Sandeepnirvan if you are not sure about the contribution you are about to do,then dont do it unless you are confident and 100% sure.Remember any contribution from a local guide is counted as high quality contribution.
This issue also makes it difficult to mark business’ as permanently closed if they have gone under during lockdown, or in some cases, larger chains have taken lockdown to close branches permanently. There’s a Subway & Carphone Warehouse near me which have both closed down, signs removed and stores gutted. I’ve also have confirmation of permanent closure, either by notice in the window or verbally from staff. Clearly these stores will not reopen but it is impossible to mark them as permanently closed with this change to edits.
I am experiecing the same issue. A store was permanently closed (e.g. signs taken off, news about it in the press) after it was temporarily closed initially.
I tried to open it to be able to close it permanently, but it is not possible - maybe because the owner has to confirm.
How to permanently close businesses that are on temporarily closed status?
