For the past 6 months getting any updates or adding new locations with no/some/a lot of information constantly is not being accepted.
Incredibly frustrating to see hard work and effort being denied with no real explanation or way to resolve it. I think this needs to be addressed as it definitely takes the wind out of guide sails and demotivates from being more active in the community.
This comes at a time especially when my workplace has been fraudulently marked closed numerous times. So why my edits and additions are not being approved even though they are truthful when other people’s fake and it’s an additions are being approved. It’s enough to make fun Wonder at the very least.
But I figured see if anybody has any solution or ideas. And if it would prove helpful definitely willing to go into detail and show pictures of what I’ve been trying to submit.
Hi @Nomad8324
The first element that should be considered about adding a place in Google Maps is the possibility to have the place verified. Due to the large amount of contributions, the verification is mostly based on the possibility to find information online about the place. Public directories, but also articles about the place are used as a base for the verification.
The second one is just a tip: keep it simple. A lot of people think that to have the edit approved it is necessary to add as much information as you can: phone number, website, opening time, and they also add a lot of photos. But if one of the various elements cannot be verified, the whole edit will be rejected. Normally when I add a place I only add the basic elements: Name, Category, Address. Sometimes I also add a photo of the storefront where the name of the place is visible. Normally [in my case] it is approved in a few hours. Once approved, I add one by one the opening hours, the phone number and the website.
Of course there is a “trust factor” in there: a Local Guide with a high score of accepted additions will be trusted more than a newcomer.
For more details about the approval process you can read: [Why is my edit status “Pending” or “Not Applied”?](Why is my edit status “Pending” or “Not Applied”?).
I also want to inform you that I am changing your Category to Google Maps tips & tricks where it fit better. I have also removed the “Accessibility” tag, that is not related to the content of your post, and added some additional tag. For more details about this please read What are Connect categories?
Thanks for the update. But I have tried is doing very basic updates too some information everything you could possibly imagine short of being actual owner of place.
This has resulted in months or the headaches where again legitimate factual documented changes are discredited and false and edits somehow are approved.
If it will help I will give you exact locations and the exact information that I have given about several locations recently that almost put me off being a local guide because of the difficulty of getting anything accepted.
I will further add that as nice as the intent of having why is my edit still pending or rejected is good for information. It is otherwise substantially useless because there’s no way to know what you’re doing wrong if anything and I firmly believe that in my case at least I was doing everything correctly the system just decided to choose no over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over… On edits that should have been made live.
Thank you for sharing more details, @Nomad8324.
If you are trying to add your own business you should go through a different procedure: Add your own Business.
In this way you will also have more control of your listing in Google Maps.
For more details you should address your queries on the Google Business profile help Community: https://support.google.com/business/community?hl=en
Hello. Thanks for sharing your efforts in the Local Guides Connect community. You may want to triple-check that your business is eligible for a Google Business Profile: Guidelines for representing your business on Google - Google Business Profile Help … perhaps there is something about your business that doesn’t fit the criteria?
Well here is how this started omitting my current employer for privacy reasons. Which has been flagged a closed by competition successfully several times.
But Here is the first place I attempted to edit.
As you can see it was closed after the tragic death of the one of the cofounders of this location. I was quite saddened to see it close and wanted to spare anyone else coming to this location from wasting a long drive only to be greeted with a closed signed.
No biggie reported it closed. REFUSED.
Reported it closed again a week later with pictures of the statement from the family and a screenshot of the new article with the ADDRESS. REFUSED.
Tried again a few different times all REFUSED.
Finally ended up being there and took a PICTURE OF THE CLOSED SIGN and UP FOR LEASE signs. REFUSED.
Did it again REFUSED.
Finally on the approx. 8th time reporting it closed was it finally marked as permanently closed 3 months after the fact. With mountains of evidence each time.
For the second issue my mom was involved in a traffic accident involving a deer and her car towed to Buds Towing. I put it in Maps to be greeted to one 218 miles away in a different state and only after 15 minutes of digging did I find the address. Forwarned by how annoying editing was with the restaurant I went full out and attempted to add the business listing so others could find it.
As you may have guessed REFUSED, REFUSED, REFUSED…
Pictures of business cards, photos of their sign, photos from the road of the address.
I really do not know anything else I could have done short of video and interviews.
But again all refused and even on a separate account it still was refused. I tried every variation listing the bare bones, listing half to listing everything. Refused.
So its really difficult to want to even bother with all of this with no real way to know EXACTLY why it was refused. No rhyme or reason evident. No appeals process but hey we do have a FAQ with some vague reasons why you answer might not be accepted or stuck pending.
Yet someone or someone’s has marked my employer as closed and got it off for usually about 12 hours each time.
I remember when we had forums dedicated to improving google maps and providing edits and there was some interaction and feedback.
I guess in conclusion I feel like my time is being wasted and that has caused me to spend even less time reviewing and update since this whole experience has left a bad taste in my mouth to some degree and it could be fixed but I don’t know how much longer I can keep submitting things knowing it will likely be refused.
But hopefully something productive comes from this. I can hope at least.
