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TIL that Google had a payments hold on my Play Console account since January 2024 (!!!) that prevented sales to users in Brazil. 0 communicationt, no alerts to let me know, just a silent hold. The reason I even investigated it is thanks to two Brazilian users reaching out in the last 2 months.

Houssam Elbadissi ❄️

@skaldebane.dev

18 Feb

I've had intermittent "can't pay" reviews over the past 2 years, but I shrugged them off as one-off issues, particularly since none of them emailed with more context. All I can see is the device language, which for the 2 users contacting me was Portuguese and English, no pattern to notice either.

Houssam Elbadissi ❄️

@skaldebane.dev

18 Feb

After these 2 reports, and some back and forth with Play Console support, I've been told that there was some hold on my account, and that I should follow through with the Google Payments team instead. And indeed, this is what the payments team had to say:

Houssam Elbadissi ❄️

@skaldebane.dev

Given that Brazil is one of the largest user-bases I have (aside from U.S, India, and some EU countries), this means a meaningful portion of revenue was lost to nothing. Considering it's a one-time purchase, for a niche utility app with low retention, most of these users are never coming back.

18/2/26, 2:41 pm0 reposts0 likes

Houssam Elbadissi ❄️

@skaldebane.dev

18 Feb

But this was still a very fortunate time to find out about this, given that Font Viewer isn't making much revenue to begin with, with a few purchases scattered across each month. Since I'm about to release larger apps where I've invested a ton of time, it was good to figure this out before then!