Comments on: When Google Places Doesn’t Work, It Really Doesn’t Work

By: Kal

Kal — Wed, 09 Feb 2011 20:37:33 +0000

The funny thing is that this can be fixed by Google quite easily.
Sometimes it really shows how Google and their customer service department/s really works and where their heart really is!

Relevancy my b*tt!

By: MiriamEllis

MiriamEllis — Wed, 02 Feb 2011 05:02:51 +0000

Kent,
Unless you work for Google, you can’t actually contact anyone there. Perhaps I’ve missed hidden irony in your comment?

By: Kent

Kent — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 23:31:44 +0000

You can also contact google customer service directly if you know how to (a person not report a bad link)get to them and with a situation like this they should be able to fix it relatively quickly.

By: Steve Dale

Steve Dale — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 17:01:41 +0000

After losing half my hair to this problem I found a bit of a solution. Delete all, yes all listing 100%. Repost with photos that are on flickr or photobucket and use the links from the photosite to the places ad. Make 5 short videos with the correct info on the voice over, post on youtube and use the links to juice up your G places. Now the phone confirmations, this is where it gets tricky. The person who is setting up the G places needs to have another person turn off the phone systems and have a direct line into the room. The phones will be shut off for less than 3 minutes, do it at night or at closing. The next part is the reviews and citations, I’ll address that another day.

By: Andrew Huskinson

Andrew Huskinson — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 16:53:26 +0000

Hi,

Another example of googles poor analysis, programming and testing.

Throwing a heap of young kids at an application, however clever Mike, does not make up for experience and the resulting foresight.

I expect a lawyer would have a field day with google over ‘due diligence’ some day.

Cheers. Andrew.

By: Mike

Mike — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 16:17:50 +0000

@Christopher
As Google has pointed out though, if merged once and you delete, the same thing will happen again if enough has not changed. I deleted one listing in a merged pair and within 2 weeks it had merged back in.

@Brian
Yes I agree. If a couple using Google Maps goes down an unmaintained mountain rode and gets all kind of press…. think what will happen on the emergency call or drive up the results in a death.

By: Brian Combs

Brian Combs — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 16:09:45 +0000

I suspect it’ll take something horrible happening, and a resulting lawsuit, before Google gets around to fixing this.

By: Christopher Smith

Christopher Smith — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 15:01:28 +0000

Deletion and readdition of each place with the correct data may be the only option here. I saw an article a while back commenting on two similar, near-to-each-other businesses that had details mixed together, and no matter how much was changed, nothing would ever get corrected. They were advised to delete both places and resubmit with the correct info.

I would at least try it on the less-important places first to see if it shows any sign of working.

By: MiriamEllis

MiriamEllis — Tue, 01 Feb 2011 08:21:31 +0000

Geez, I’m especially concerned about the campus police part, Mike. Here we go again with the very real, potential life-and-death impacts of NAP. Fooling around doesn’t cut it. Emergency data of this kind should be given priority status, pronto. I can imagine that few families would feel safe or happy knowing about this hazardous situation in Google with UofM’s emergency data. None of the mistakes are acceptable, but this particular issue belongs in a category of its own, in terms of urgency.

Google just decided it wouldn’t be showing real estate listings in future. I feel that Google should consider pulling all emergency info out of the index until they are capable of handling it with reasonable accuracy.