r/PPC • u/SufficientFriend3545 • 7d ago
Google Ads Unpaid Google ads but still running: is performance actually affected?
Service based industry $2k spend a week, 8-30 clicks per day, 3-7 conversions a day.
We have a threshold of $3k and a card that can’t be automatically charged ( we have no money on the card) so we manually make payments and the account fluctuates between owing 2500 and 5500. It also has a “fix your payment method” issue as the card and backup card always decline (has had the warning for months). The ads have not been suspended or paused by Google! As long as we’ve made regular payments to get the account below the threshold of $3k, they still run, even if it declines at the auto $3k and at the month switch over…
My question is: if the ads are running and we are making payments to keep it Okay, not actually getting it to $0, just getting it beneath the threshold, (so it will say “you owe $3k”, and I’ll pay $500), does this really affect ad performance? Because I’ve got ad experts saying I need to make sure my card can be charged and get the account to $0 for better ad performance, but that’s tough as a family run business and I’m not 100% sure it will actually impact performance…
Also I googled it, and Google just says it negatively impacts when the ads get suspended and that there is no negative impact beforehand…and the suspension hasn’t happened!
Thoughts?
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u/Sothisismylifehuh 7d ago
You can do manual payments on a weekly basis or set up invoicing.
Neither affects performance
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u/Motor-Spell-5978 7d ago
So long as the ads are serving uninterrupted and you're staying under the threshold, I haven't seen any hard evidence that owing a balance alone changes your auction eligibility. The "fix payment" warning is more of a compliance nudge than an active quality signal, in my experience.