> Google's classic canned response of "We've confirmed we're right, we will not tell you why and this is the last reply you'll receive" is one of the most infuriating things I can imagine.
For non-negligible damages, heading immediately to small claims court (given you live in a sensible jurisdiction) seems to be the easiest thing in that case. Even if Google's ultimately in the right, they typically can't just ignore that entirely.
Well, that really depends on the case and jurisdiction, I can't answer that for you. Really, the key part is to force Google to actually provide reasoning for their actions, as they eventually did in the case I edited in links for.
Going to court twice to get Google to pay $0 in damages and not reinstate your account doesn't sound like "the easiest thing" to me. It's at best a Pyrrhic victory.
I get the desire to impose costs on Google for their bad actions, but this doesn't seem like a very productive plan.
Well yes, giving up is almost always the easiest option in any situation. I mean easier than attempting to navigate Google support channels or having the right internal connections.
The problem is that regardless of whether they are or not, getting to a point where a judge looks it over is a process most can’t go through with an opponent like Google.
Again, depends on the jurisdiction, but in the UK filling for a small claims court case would be like £125? And if they don't show up the case will almost certainly be ruled in your favour and Google ordered to pay back whatever they owe you - plus any court costs you incurred. It's really not that difficult. Even paying a lawyer £100 to write and send them a letter "you have 7 days to fix this or we're going to court" would most likely achieve better result than trying to contact their useless customer service.
For non-negligible damages, heading immediately to small claims court (given you live in a sensible jurisdiction) seems to be the easiest thing in that case. Even if Google's ultimately in the right, they typically can't just ignore that entirely.
From a decade ago:
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/why-i-sued-google-and-won_b_1...
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/why-google-bothered-to-ap_b_2...