Opening her email, Melanie Hunter makes a slightly foreboding statement: “I’m striving for brevity and clarity in this email, so I suggest a cup of tea or coffee at your side.” She also teasingly warns her reader against falling asleep halfway through.
Melanie, for over two decades, has been crafting rhymed and traditional speeches, and penning poems for events like weddings, special birthdays, retirements, and funerals. During one of the lockdowns amid the Covid-19 outbreak, a funeral eulogy she penned was recited by a gentleman acquaintance of hers, leading him to impulsively recommend that she give formal shape to her writings and launch a venture of her own.
Melanie, who had already worn her running shoes down to the brink of illegality from all her lockdown walking, kept an open mind about his suggestion. To paraphrase her long story, she hired a budget-friendly web designer from New York to establish her venture, naming it InStanza, which offers a speech-writing service for various occasions requiring celebration in life.
Unfortunately for Melanie, her fervour didn’t prove enough to kick start her retirement plans. She quickly realised that though people relished the thought of having a unique speech created for their event, they had reservations about reading it aloud. Feeling undeterred, she put her new running shoes to use and went back to the drawing board, unveiling a new concept: the instaframe.
Melanie had an unfortunate journey setting up her online business of professionally framed rhymed pieces – a gift to be cherished for a lifetime. At first glance, it appears she didn’t need any assistance from Pricewatch, however, that’s when her journey started taking a downturn.
In order to include the concept of ‘instaframes’ on her website, she was compelled to purchase an ecommerce site and hire a web developer to restructure the entirety of it. As she described, the process was gruelling and compared the experience of it to being attacked by multiple jellyfish.
Nonetheless, with considerable initial expenditure and a subsequently heavy monthly burden of €130, her team of developers eventually established a Google Business Account for her, catalogued her business on several online platforms, and got Melanie’s operation moving forward.
Just moments after her site went live – a mere 5½ minutes to be precise – she was emailed by the web designers informing her about the necessity to submit a verification video to Google with the help of her mobile phone. The procedure was strict, with no option to prerecord and upload the video.
The perplexity surrounding Google’s verification process became evident when they demanded proof of her business address, which is essentially her home address in Greystones. However, for security reasons, her website depicts her spouse’s office address in town. This created a discord with Google’s verification checks as Melanie puts it.
In this baffling verification process, she was directed to capture her entire house and its surrounding street in her video. Google mandated her to film the exterior and interior of her house, reveal her house’s name and number, and even film herself unlocking her front door. This was followed by showing her working space inside and scrolling through her social media accounts on her laptop. Moreover, she had to film her company registration papers and her printed bank statement. A process she deemed utterly invasive and strange to the point of nearly sharing her baby pictures.
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The video intended for the business contained various images of business cards and the designer instaframes she planned to sell. Panned shots of her driving licence and passport were also included. She jokily remarked that she almost included her baby pictures.
Thinking about the event, Pricewatch admits the ordeal sounds like a nightmare. Melanie concurred; this was merely the start of her misery.
After recording the video, she tried to upload it. It failed, and a dismissive Google message suggested she try again, inducing an intense eye-rolling reaction from her. Each retry yielded the same disappointing result.
Melanie explains that she had to recreate and upload the video approximately fifteen times before Google finally accepted it, with notifications that the verification process could take as long as ten working days.
Three weeks following Melanie’s quest for verification, she received an email declaring her attempt had failed and encouraging her to try again. Her frustration levels were mounting, and the ordeal was taking a toll on her mental health. She was unable to publicise her new site, as it was unverified. She couldn’t advertise through Google or Instagram, dreading that potential customers would be directed to the unverified site.
She attempted to contact Google, reaching several members of their support team. Their ineffective solution was to resend the same link, encouraging her to attempt the video again.
Despite the demoralising setbacks, Melanie persevered and discovered an error in the landline number listed on her site by the developers. Google took issue with this. She decided to hire an expert who successfully remedied some issues. However, he cautiously informed her that she would need to create yet another video.
Facing a sense of disbelief, she found herself needing to repeat the same tiresome task of re-creating the video numerous times, with memories of previous experiences becoming a blur, according to her. Google finally accepted her video in June, informing her it would be returned in 10 business days. Yet when this timeline exceeded, she felt compelled to reach out to Pricewatch on the 11th day.
Melanie admits her tale may be lengthy, but she states it’s solely to demonstrate the challenging nature of dealing with Google. She argues that, as a petite Irish enterprise, she feels it’s not right to be subjected to the brash, oppressive behaviour. She feels victimised despite adhering to all verification criteria, arguing that there seems to be a bias against smaller firms in favour of larger rivals.
Referring to the recurrent rejections of her verification video and the absence of clarity in the verification process, she believes it’s become increasingly difficult to identify which specific requirements she was not satisfying. Melanie likens her experience to being a cast member in the movie Groundhog Day.
Despite the David versus Goliath aspect, Melanie professes that it’s not acceptable for corporations to continue this manner of conduct with the smaller businesses. Her main point of frustration stems from the vague feedback provided on her various submission attempts for small business verification, a process which she believes is negatively impacting her business progression and operations.
Fundamentally, Melanie was seeking minimal assistance from Google to establish her business. She pinpoints the numerous dubious activities that transpire online, contrasting it with her inability to get verified despite purely selling poetry and speeches from her home kitchen. Declaring an obvious injustice in the situation, she likens herself to the Mona Lisa sat motionless in the midst of it all, but perhaps, sans the wry smile.
Our page hasn’t engaged with Google before, and Melanie’s case marked our first approach with some apprehension. However, giving due credit, they took Melanie’s case seriously. While the company refrained from making a public comment, we received a response from Melanie a few days after we intervened.
As she opened her second email, her excitement was palpable, as if it were Christmas morning while she sat at her kitchen table. She was preparing to pen a couple of poetic speeches for upcoming nuptials when she decided to glance at her Google account. To her astonishment, there it was – the coveted little blue tick that she’d been pining for since February. She was now officially verified. A sense of relief washed over her, the time spent anxiously pacing her driveway and filming herself unlocking her front door was now a thing of the past.