Google Removing Call History Feature on GBP?

[creekmoremarketing]

Looking into our company's GBP this morning, we are unable to view Call History on the back end of GBP. Has this feature been removed? We are trying to further attribute where calls to our company came from and removing the call history feature is making it difficult.

 

[marketerjoe]

A coworker just reported to me that a client is complaining about their profile not showing the phone number. This is obviously because Call-tracking has been activated. However, we cannot find the section to activate or deactivate call tracking on ANY profile! It used to be between "add a picture" and "messages"

This is not normal. There have been reports before in this forum of some sections vanishing from this menu, but I've never seen it happen across all the GBPs in an agency account!

Great news... I was able to fix this phone issue for a client! After hours of research into this I finally fixed it by the good old fashioned process of trial and error. Google was no help. After submitting a support ticket to them they had no clue. Essentially Google's GBP interface and features is being buggy. For example, I was supposed to have access to the call history feature so I could turn it on or off, however I didn't. To make matters worse, call tracking was essentially on but just not accessible, so I was basically stuck in a black hole. So what I did was I completely removed the phone number from the GBP by using the "Don't show my number on my GBP" option. Once that change propagated I then went back in and re-enabled the phone number which it made me completely re-add the business phone number. After this change propagated then what do you know it gave me access to the call history section that was missing before! I was then able to click on the illusive call settings and disable call tracking!

 

[JoyHawkins]

Amazing! Thanks for sharing your workaround!

 

[JoyHawkins]

@Colan Nielsen noticed the other day this feature is back on a bunch of listings.

 

[keyserholiday]

A coworker just reported to me that a client is complaining about their profile not showing the phone number. This is obviously because Call-tracking has been activated. However, we cannot find the section to activate or deactivate call tracking on ANY profile! It used to be between "add a picture" and "messages"

This is not normal. There have been reports before in this forum of some sections vanishing from this menu, but I've never seen it happen across all the GBPs in an agency account!

It's under advanced settings. Click on the three dots and select advanced settings.

 

[creekmoremarketing]

It's under advanced settings. Click on the three dots and select advanced settings.

In this case, we are trying to see the call log from Calls coming in through GBP, not disabling the number on the profile. Previously, we were able to see the phone number and timestamp of calls coming in and our CRM notates where the lead came from. Not having this eliminates our attribution of our leads from this source

 

[JS Girard]

And we are trying to get the damn thing turned off for a client complaining that the calls are not routing to his actual number.

 

[JS Girard]

Oh, we spent half the day trying. The calls button ("appels" in French) is nowhere to be seen as you yourself have pointed out. That is the problem. I have sent in a ticket over this.

 

[JoyHawkins]

Okay, just got confirmation that this is a feature Google got rid of. I'm going to DM you to get some details because I asked Google how the heck people turn it off and they asked for examples.

 

[Jim Froling]

Okay, just got confirmation that this is a feature Google got rid of. I'm going to DM you to get some details because I asked Google how the heck people turn it off and they asked for examples.

Bummer! Of all the metrics (?) that Insights provides, this was perhaps the most useful. The rest, highly suspect as you pointed out recently about the "Request for direction" on Sterling Sky's profile. It's your home. You don't have an address posted (as I recall from your post). Yet it still showed a number of "Actions" requesting directions.

In my client's cases, no one turned "off" this feature. It just disappeared about a week ago.

At first I thought it could be a YMYL thing. I first noticed it on the Insights for a dentist. Maybe it's a minimum threshold thing? But I've checked a number of other types of clients (flooring stores, restaurants, etc.). which typically get dozens of phone calls from their profile each month. This call reporting feature is simply GONE.

The one most "insightful" Insights from a GBP report... gone.

Bummer!!

 

[marketerjoe]

I originally had call tracking enabled for my agency, even though that option is no longer available in GBP reporting, the tracking number that was enabled by Google to originally make it work is still active. The number is still forwarded correctly, but I would assume that eventually those tracking numbers will be decommissioned.

You can double-check it by going to a GBP on a mobile device, tapping on the Call button and seeing what phone number comes up in the dialer.

Mine was incorrect.

I went into Business Profile Settings >> Advanced Settings & activated the “Don’t show” slider in the Phone number section (there is no save option I just closed the Advanced settings dialog box and it was applied):

2023-09-10_19-36-37

It took about 2 hours before I saw it removed from the profile (YMMV).

After it was removed, I simply went back to that same setting and set it back to the deactivate position:

2023-09-10_19-38-11

I then went back into the phone number section, which was now showing as blank and added the phone number back in.

After about 15 minutes, the phone number was showing on the profile again, but when I went into an incognito window and selected the call button, that original tracking number was back.

The same thing happened to me originally (the Google tracking number reappeared), however what was different was I could see a call button in my GBP options and when I click that calls button I can modify call settings and turn call tracking off. Do you not see the "Calls" button as shown in the image below?

 

[JS Girard]

A coworker just reported to me that a client is complaining about their profile not showing the phone number. This is obviously because Call-tracking has been activated. However, we cannot find the section to activate or deactivate call tracking on ANY profile! It used to be between "add a picture" and "messages"

This is not normal. There have been reports before in this forum of some sections vanishing from this menu, but I've never seen it happen across all the GBPs in an agency account!

 

[JS Girard]

I am not talking about hiding the phone number. I am talking about disabling Google Call-tracking, which is apparently active on this client's profile, but the option to activate or deactivate it apepars to have been removed.

If Google somehow decided to remove this feature for Quebec while not actually deactivating it for clients who had it on, it is a monumental fuck up on their part.

 

[keyserholiday]

And we are trying to get the damn thing turned off for a client complaining that the calls are not routing to his actual number.

Ben Fisher tweeted that it was removed.

 

[JS Girard]

Yeah. Called it! Now I need to check again whether the feature is ACTUALLY disabled on our client. Because as my initial problem indicates, "the features is not accessible" and "the feature is disabled" are clearly not the same thing here!

 

[JS Girard]

Yeah. Called it! Now I need to check again whether the feature is ACTUALLY disabled on our client. Because as my initial problem indicates, "the features is not accessible" and "the feature is disabled" are clearly not the same thing here!

For the record, we have confirmed that as of today, the client is STILL displaying a tracking number.

 

[mblumenthal]

Can you confirm that you can't shut off Call History via this path?

Turn off call history
From Google Search

1. On your computer, sign in to the Google Account you use to manage your Business Profile.
2. To find your Business Profile, search on Google for your exact business name. You can also search for my business.
   • If needed, to open your Business Profile, select View profile.
3. Click Customers
   
   Calls.
   • Tip: On your desktop, on Google Search, select Calls.
4. Click the 3-dot menu
   
   
   Calls settings.
5. Turn off Turn on call history.

 

[mblumenthal]

I will be curious to hear if it automatically reverts or not

 

[JS Girard]

I will be curious to hear if it automatically reverts or not

I would be too, but in this case we couldn't afford to wait around with an angry client.

Support emailed yesterday to let us know they "have gone ahead and stopped the call tracking", and today it is indeed gone.

 

[valentinb13]

Okay, just got confirmation that this is a feature Google got rid of. I'm going to DM you to get some details because I asked Google how the heck people turn it off and they asked for examples.

I'm pretty sure we're having the exact same problem. Client has the call button on their profile but it's routing to a wrong/disconnected number that is not their number. There's no way to fix the call button number. I've sent a GBP support ticket but other than we can't figure out what to do.