Biting the silver bullet with AdSense

google logo Biting the silver bullet with AdSenseI very recently cancelled my Google AdSense account; this was to do with not being able to be paid and I slowly built up a significant tab, which I was not able to withdraw or cash-in on. A couple days ago I decided to, essentially, bite the bullet and close the account. I mean, why continue building up cash, when you can’t withdraw it. The only way I could see myself withdrawing it is if I went back to Taiwan. Now, unless they owed me $2,000 then it’s simply not worth going back.

I had built up around $100 — which is somewhat significant and is of course something that I worked hard in getting. If you’re reading this, you are probably asking, why did you close your AdSense account that still had around $100 dollars in it?

AdSense does not allow you to change countries…

… from Taiwan to the United Kingdom. They don’t allow you to change countries due to legal reasons, according to the message that popped up when trying to change  from Taiwan to the United Kingdom in the AdSense account settings tab. While I did reach the payment threshold, – and they did say they’d send payment within 90 days to an address in Taiwan where my friends are living, how will I cash that? I’m guessing I won’t be able to and now and that money will be in limbo. I even posted on the official Google product forums to no avail, so I guess this situation doesn’t happen very often.

It doesn’t matter anymore. I now have a UK AdSense account and while I’m posting about AdSense, I’d like to point out the very significant differences in the Taiwan (Asian?) AdSense control panel and the UK AdSense control panel.

UK AdSense vs Asian AdSense control panel

I’ll be honest by saying that I never really knew there was a difference in control panels until I recently switched over to the UK AdSense control panel; it’s significantly different to it’s Asian counterpart. The Taiwan or Asian control panel version doesn’t have the option to pay direct into your bank account. Instead, you have to either accept a cheque or payment via Western Union. – I, of course, accepted Western Union due to their service not charging any fees. While it seems the UK control panel gives you the option to add your bank account details, so they can pay you when you reach the £60 threshold.

The UK version of AdSense looks newer. It looks sharper and it looks like someone spent some time cleaning the old version. Additionally, the UK control panel looks like it’s been updated to a newer version with more features, as it includes features like a revenue “Scorecard“, updated CSS markup (In a few areas), the ability to add new billing contacts (Which undoubtedly would have helped me with my issue), asynchronous advertisement code and probably more features that I haven’t found out about yet.

While I’ve likely lost the $100 that I earned, I think it’s time to move on and get to my next goal: £60  😀

Author: Jonathan Jones

I first first started creating websites back in 2005. This led me to creating a free web hosting business in 2007, which still exists today. I ventured into creating types of websites such as blogs and forums using Wordpress, vBulletin, Invision Power Board, Drupal and Joomla. I've since worked on some of the leading brands in the UK finance sector, in the Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) field, and now work for MoneySuperMarket, the #1 price comparison website in the UK. Social: Google+ and Twitter.

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13 Comments

  1. Hello! Jonathan Jones, I want to change google adsense country. Now I am put Switzerland and I want to change Switzerland to Pakistan What I do please help me out!

    • Hi Muhammad,

      Like I said in the article, I had to close my Taiwanese AdSense account and open one up in the UK afterwards. Unfortunately there is no facility to change from certain countries to the other. Although they do allow this for a select amount of countries. Taiwan is unfortunately not one of them.

  2. Hi Jonathan,

    I want to change country from France to Taiwan. I understand that I have no other choice than closing my Adsense account and opening a new one with my address in Taiwan. I understand also that I must use a new email address for the new account. But I’d like to know if I will be able to use the same “payee name” that I used in the old account ?

  3. I will move from Malaysia to the UK soon so this post is really helpful.

    Before I close my Adsense acc (and reapply with UK ID/email etc), do I have to do anything like informing google adsense/filling up form etc?

    Also I assume when reapply, I will need to go through the same application process again? How long did it take for you to get approved into Adsense UK? Can I use the same website that I currently using with adsense during submission of application to Adsense UK program later?

    Many thanks!

    • Hi Roy,

      You will first have to close your account before opening another one as it goes against the AdSense TOS to have more than one account.

      Here’s the guide on closing your account:
      https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/9914?hl=en-GB

      Yes, you’ll have to go through the same process where they will verify your website. It took around 2 weeks for my application to get accepted, but varies from account to account.

      Yes, you can. They’ll reassess the website to see if it would be a good fit and accept you if it is. Just make sure you close your previous AdSense account as you are “only allowed to maintain one AdSense account under the same payee name.”

      Good luck! 🙂

  4. I will move from Malaysia to the UK soon so this post is really helpful.

    Before I close my Adsense acc (and reapply with UK ID/email etc), do I have to do anything like informing google adsense/filling up form etc?

    Also I assume when reapply, I will need to go through the same application process again? How long did it take for you to get approved into Adsense UK? Can I use the same website that I currently using with adsense during submission of application to Adsense UK program later?

    Many thanks!

  5. Thanks Jonathan for the reply.

    I agree that if due to migration, the best way is to cancel the existing adsense acc and re-apply. Not to mention, especially in my case, Adsense can direct deposit to my UK bank account instead of cheque which at the moment is the only method allowed in my country.

    But I m just thinking aloud here, assuming I want to maintain my existing Adsense acc, what s stopping me to get my parents/friends to post my Adsense cheque to me so that I can cash it out in the UK? After all the payment is in the USD and not my local currency.

  6. Hi Jonathan

    If I close my ad sense account and open new one can I still have the same name of my You Tube channel?

    Regards,

    Robert

  7. Can I get payed through cheque, because I apply for adsense in a different country and now I’m in another country, can I get my payment through cheque

  8. Hi dear.i want change adsense from Vietnam country to Cambodia. How to I can do it?

    • Hi El Vannak,

      I’m not sure about transferring your account from Vietnam to Cambodia. I’m not saying it’s not possible, but I think you may have the same problems that I did in my post. I recall even trying to switch my account to Japan or some other country as a test, and that didn’t work either. I received the same message saying that they could not change it due to legal reasons, so not even proximity to a country helped.

      Let me know how it goes though!

  9. Hi Jonathan, desperate for some help here! I recently moved from Singapore back to the UK. I closed my Singapore adsense last night and have attempted to reopen a new UK one. However when I do it says ‘This URL is not available for signing up for AdSense’ Did you experience anything similar? What am i doing wrong?