[HN Gopher] Tell HN: Google Play blocked payments for RIDERS app...
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Tell HN: Google Play blocked payments for RIDERS app with 1M users
Google blocked our payment profile for Riders App
(https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.whitescape...).
After 2 months of providing all of the required docs and getting
auto-declines, I've talked to their support and they just answered
(quote): "I have consulted our specialist about your account. Our
specialist team has determined that this profile must stay
suspended due to violations of our Terms of Service. We're unable
to discuss the specific circumstances of this or any suspensions.
Our Google Payments Terms of Service states that Google Payments
Corp. reserves the right to change, suspend, or discontinue any
aspect of the Services at any time, including availability of the
Services, or any Service feature, without notice or liability."
The app has nearly 25k of positive ratings and currently one of the
most popular apps for action sport participants. I frankly don't
have any idea what to do, that's super sad.
Author : igordebatur
Score : 71 points
Date : 2022-03-30 21:40 UTC (1 hours ago)
| CamperBob2 wrote:
| Don't forget to cc: your state and national legislators. They are
| the only ones who can actually fix this.
|
| In your letter, point out that any sufficiently-dominant
| corporation is indistinguishable from a government, and do they
| really want the competition?
| igordebatur wrote:
| I want to, but I'll need to 'Google' how it's done first. I
| never thought I'll need to lawyer up against Google. Shit.
| jeroenhd wrote:
| The owner of the app, Whitespace, is listed on Google as having
| their headquarters in St Petersburg. Could it be related to this:
| https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answ...?
| Google has suspended payments to Russia as a consequence of the
| Russian invasion of Ukraine and the many sanctions results from
| that (like kicking many Russian banks from the international
| payment system).
|
| Whitescape also lists a location in Estonia, which obviously
| isn't a problem, but if Google doesn't know about that (or thinks
| you're misleading them) then you might still be screwed.
| igordebatur wrote:
| The app was published many years ago by Whitescape, the agency
| we owned at that point. I was born in Russia 35+ years ago. But
| now I'm the resident of Canada. Google has never asked me about
| this.
|
| But even that must not be the case: since then the Google Play
| account and it's payment profile are associated with Riders app
| Inc (the US Delaware c-corp) and our new bank account is with
| Mercury (Evolve bank and Trust)
| igordebatur wrote:
| I read an another thread where there were questions about
| legitimacy of the app. And here we are: we have 25k+ positive
| ratings, the app is unique, it provides value for tens of
| thousands of active users.
|
| The full disclosure is: we've closed our previous bank account to
| open a new one. Google tried to send a payment to our previous
| bank account, it has returned, they instantly locked our payments
| profile and that's it, the whole story.
| vmception wrote:
| believe it or not, jail!
|
| (the substantive nature of this comment is that Google acts
| like an autocrat and hopefully this provides introspection for
| relevant stakeholders that can eventually influence Google to
| be more collaborative)
| vsviridov wrote:
| We have the best Play store customers... because of jail.
| mathrawka wrote:
| Sounds like what I experienced last year:
| https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26918013
|
| There were issues with getting our Mercury account validated
| with Google Pay.
| StopDarkPattern wrote:
| Many companies are experiencing attacks that get their content
| banned to cause them monetary damage. Bungie being one of the
| more main stream games. Google knows very well what they're doing
| and they pretend to hide behind a wall to not get involved. I
| recommend taking your case to your state representative and also
| consulting a lawyer. Detail and record everything you have stated
| to Google about your injustice and show that they have tried to
| automate you away with dark pattern.
|
| Pursue justice.
| g_p wrote:
| If you're based in Europe, consider if there's any opportunity to
| avail yourself of this legislation - https://eur-
| lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32...
|
| Specifically, article 4 covers termination of service, and the
| rules around this. Most tech giants seem to be unaware of this
| regulation, as it's inconvenient for their "computer says no"
| model.
| barbazoo wrote:
| > "computer says no"
|
| https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0n_Ty_72Qds
| igordebatur wrote:
| I based in Canada
| donclark wrote:
| Have you considered a side-load option (not through Google Play)?
|
| Why is that not an option?
|
| Has someone documented the process and all the options in hosting
| your own app independent of Google Play?
|
| What are the drawbacks?
| colinmhayes wrote:
| > Why is that not an option?
|
| Because the vast majority of android users only download apps
| through the play store.
| duskwuff wrote:
| OP is being denied access to Google Pay payments processing,
| not to the Play Store.
| uncletammy wrote:
| I was under the impression that one of the conditions to
| being listed in the Play Store was that all in-app payments
| had to go through Google. Am I wrong about that?
| igordebatur wrote:
| This. It would be against the rules to use any other
| payment methods.
| donclark wrote:
| Point taken. But if he hosts it himself, could he not use
| whichever payment processor (except Google Play)?
| metadat wrote:
| Most users are too inept to install a downloaded APK.
|
| Furthermore, even if they somehow understand how to do it,
| Google chrome and Android OS work together to make it
| _extremely scary sounding for end users_.
|
| The combined messaging is akin to:
|
| "you're about to infect your own baby with HIV, press [ok] to
| cancel or [cancel] to abort operation and report as malware to
| goggle."
|
| This isn't anticompetitive, is it? Gargoygle is only trying to
| keep you safe by preventing you from running what you want on
| your own device. There are _no other possible solutions_ to
| protect people from malware, dummy! /s
|
| Capitalism seems pretty effective compared to tested
| alternatives, but it sure does encourage a lot of
| counterproductive and nasty stomp-and-screw-the-little-people
| behaviors.
| igordebatur wrote:
| The problem is, at least a half of the audience is not tech-
| savvy, plus Google Play is a part of monopoly: it brings extra
| traffic. If the app is not on google play, it can't compete
| with others
| car_analogy wrote:
| > We're unable to discuss the specific circumstances of this or
| any suspensions.
|
| This is a lie. They're not _unable_ , they're _unwilling_.
| uncletammy wrote:
| This type of subtle corporate Newspeak enrages me. It's
| corporate gaslighting and I wish I understood it's intended
| goal. For me, the only thing it achieves is solidifying my
| resolve to end business with the offending company while
| simultaneously resenting the support agent who's willing to lie
| to strangers for money.
| tehlike wrote:
| it's both. Explaining the case (by a support person) might be
| evidence used in court for wrongdoing. That's similar to the
| reasons why most interviews won't tell you why you are
| rejected.
| car_analogy wrote:
| Even if true, that still falls under unwilling. But is there
| a single case where being given a reason for a ban has been
| used to successfully sue someone? (Assuming the reason is
| half-way legitimate, i.e. not "You were banned based on a
| protected characteristic.")
|
| I'm rather sick of implausible legal scenarios being imagined
| to excuse corporate behavior. At least let their PR
| department come up with excuses, don't do it for free.
| santoshalper wrote:
| Not wanting to expose yourself to legal liability may be good
| business sense, but it is absolutely a choice they are
| making. It's not like they are under a consent order from the
| DOJ not to tell these guys why their account was suspended.
|
| This sounds like splitting hairs but I think it's a
| meaningful difference. Powerful people and companies use
| Bullshit as a means of obfuscating their motives and actions.
| They hire armies of lawyers and PR flacks to message
| everything in a way that absolves them of responsibility. You
| can't just take stuff like this at face value.
|
| They just murdered a business partner's company and won't
| even tell them why. It is possible that he's lying to us and
| was doing some shady shit (shady people almost never tell you
| they are being shady), or it is possible that he just got
| crushed by a Kafkaesque bureaucratic machine.
| jtbayly wrote:
| And I know which one I think it is...
| igordebatur wrote:
| But in our case it looks like they're not willing to solve
| the issue at all. They will surely help someone who pays
| them millions in commissions, but they're not interested
| even to talk to smaller fish.
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(page generated 2022-03-30 23:00 UTC)