
Spanish Boy Racks Up €100K Bill, Google Cancels The Charge - proofmaster
https://freshasfuck.net/2016/10/07/spanish-boy-makes-100000-euro-bill-google-cancels-the-charge/
======
the_duke
In Austria, you are not contractually capable until you are 14, and from 14-18
you are so only in a limited fashion, as allowed by the assets available to
you.

Probably Spain has similar laws (age of majority is 18 in Spain), making the
whole AdWords contract invalid. So there would not have been any way for
Google to get the money.

So this most likely wasn't anything 'charitable' done by Google, just the law.

Nothing to see here, move along...

~~~
wslh
You just gave me a good idea to save a lot of money in ads: Mechanical Turk
for kids... just kidding!

~~~
Cyph0n
Yeah back to the 19th century we go. People love old school stuff, so VCs will
probably fund the shit out of it :p

------
hanoz
What happened to the original title? This one makes it sound like a bizarre
forgery story.

~~~
the_duke
Agreed.

I read the title as "spanish boy counterfeits a 100,000 Euro bill and tries to
pay Google with it".

~~~
ythl
Where are you from that "racks up" means "counterfeits" and not "accumulates"?

~~~
the_duke
The original title was "Spanish boy Makes 100,000 Euro bill".

------
akcreek
I spend about $20k/mo with Adwords and, at least in the US, Google charges
every $500. I'll often have multiple charges from them on my card per day
during the week. I find it very annoying to have all of these small charges to
review on our expense report and asked that they increase the threshold and
they refused.

I've never not paid a bill (it's automatic), but I find it extremely hard to
believe that once the payment failed at 500 Euro they would allow the account
to accrue 99,500 Euro more in charges. That is assuming they have a similar
threshold to charge where this user was.

------
reustle
So, you can get away with blowing >$100k on adwords and nobody bats an eye (he
was auto-billed), but on AWS I can't spin up more than a few elastic IPs or
EBS volumes without going through verification hoops :)

~~~
dorfsmay
Agreed, if anything, this story is interesting because it shows that Google
will let brand new customers go from 0 to 100 k$ without any checking!

I really thought I had to add a credit card before I could use adwords,and
that they charge at the end of the first month.

I feel like there's something missing from this story.

~~~
beejiu
He _was_ being billed from his savings account. It was only when the threshold
increased (which Google increases after some time) that the bank raised the
warning. (Source: The Register)

~~~
dorfsmay
Ok, this explains it. Thanks!

Big surprise, a site named "freshasfuck" is not a really good source for news!

------
ikeboy
1\. Get kids to open AdWords accounts for you

2\. Spend 100k on each on affiliate marketing. Even a non optimized campaign
on a good offer is still going to bring in 5 figures

3\. ??????

4\. Profit

~~~
Scirra_Tom
They'd presumably be advertising your services though (not the kids website).
Easier to establish fraud.

~~~
ikeboy
Not your services, affiliate marketing. Much harder to determine who got the
payout.

~~~
Scirra_Tom
Seems risky still, $100k risk for n% of $100k payout. They might say they'd
waive it if you can show the advertised accounts are in the kids name, and
that the kid refunds all the money from their account.

In the original artcile, the ad being run was for his band. Doubt he made any
money at all.

------
troels
So, someone in Google's accounting department handled a mistake in a mature
and responsible way. Good on them.

~~~
alvarosm
They should have charged the idiot parents who gave him access to their bank
account. But they did not only in order to save face and not be portrayed as
an evil corporation by the media.

There are no mistakes here. The idiot kid wanted publicity at any cost, the
idiot parents want to give the kid everything he wants and Google doesn't want
any more hostile propaganda in Europe.

~~~
nommm-nommm
The boy had his own bank account. It was a joint account with his parents so
his parents were notified of the charges.

------
webtechgal
Something definitely smells out of place here.

I believe the AdWords policies vary from country to country (and from time to
time) but the last I checked (2015), here in India, you had to have at least
one verifiable payment method (card/bank account) in order to even activate an
AdWords account, leave alone the matter of running up a balance of Euro
100,000.

So how did a 12 y-o manage to do that?

~~~
dazc
The story as reported on bbc radio 4 last night said his parents let him add
some bank details - either their own or some other account like a trust fund
that needed their consent.

I wasn't really listening enough to remember the exact details but it rang
true enough for me not to question it. Other than his parents being very
trusting or very naive, of course?

/More detail [http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/37571304/boy-racks-
up-...](http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/article/37571304/boy-racks-
up-100000-euro-bill-advertising-his-brass-band)

"A savings account had been opened in the boy's name and he used those details
when signing up for AdWords."

------
mattparlane
To me, the problem is that all this kid really did is hike up the bid price of
competitive keywords, therefore earning more money for Google. I have the same
issue with them giving away money for trials, or giving thousands to non-
profits.

It's gaming their own system from within -- if someone is given money to
splurge on Adwords, they will pour it into really competitive keywords without
really caring about the return, jacking up the price for those who are paying
real money.

It might sound altruistic, but there is a pretty real benefit for Google.

~~~
emodendroket
If my experience at a nonprofit is a guide they'll actually call endless
meetings to talk about the AdWords and then never get around to using them.

~~~
oneloop
Meaning, the nonprofit will call for meeting with adwords and never actually
use them?

~~~
emodendroket
No, they'll call meetings internally to discuss how to use the AdWords and
never decide anything or act on it.

------
jorgemf
A spanish source: [http://www.elcomercio.com/tendencias/deuda-google-nino-
publi...](http://www.elcomercio.com/tendencias/deuda-google-nino-publicidad-
travesura.html)

12 years old kid is punished to stay at home, he decides to be a famous
youtuber and somehow he ends up giving his bank account. Fist invoices are
low, after one month with a 19k invoice the bank notifies the parents and the
parents block all the invoices.

~~~
tarancato
That's not Spanish, that's from Ecuador.

~~~
pdappollonio
It's still Spanish.

~~~
tarancato
I thought he said "Spanish" meaning "a local source", not "a source in a
language other than English"

------
amluto
How is it okay that so many services don't come with a clear, configurable,
default-low cost accrual cap?

Heck, Comcast is rolling out unlimited* potential liability if you go over
without pre-purchasing a $50 insurance policy.

* Given bandwidth constraints, maybe it's only $6500/mo or so. Still.

~~~
PhantomGremlin
_Comcast is rolling out unlimited potential liability_

No, that's not true. The maximum additional liability is $200.

From the article linked to in the recent discussion
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12663935](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12663935)

 _The third time it 's exceeded within a 12 month period, however, the
"courtesy months" go away and users will be charged $10 for an additional 50GB
of data, which will continue happening to a limit of $200 per month. If you
want unlimited data access, you can buy it up front, for an additional $50 per
month over your current internet bill._

------
flippyhead
What I don't understand is how they let the bill go unpaid for so long. Seems
like ripe avenue for spammers to get free advertising.

------
jimmcslim
Of course it's the right decision, but doesn't it make a mockery of some
fundamental philosophy of the market mechanisms behind Google AdWords that it
can be cancelled?

~~~
opinali
What do you mean? No sellers got stiffed by this cancellation, if this happens
it's Google that foots the bill (minus its own share).

------
interdrift
'mom please give me 100 000 euros, I messed up a bit..'

------
rocky1138
Now _this_ is growth hacking.

------
ihunter
Next growth hacking scheme?

