Google is wrong

La Conner Weekly News moved to its new office effective May 1.

For some reason, Google just can’t accept the fact that sometimes businesses move.

So their search engine has us down as “permanently closed.”

We have emailed correction requests many times. We’ve also engaged in phone conversations with Google representatives, who claim they are trying to help.

On Tuesday, I spent most of an hour talking with a woman named Gouri, who called to investigate the ruckus we and several of our readers have been raising on their complaint forms.

She said that Google will send a postcard with a code to our new address at 119 N. Third Street.

We tried that already.

I pointed out a problem endemic to La Conner — we don’t get mail delivery at 119 N. Third. Like everyone else in town within a quarter mile of the Post Office, our mail goes to a post office box.

Gouri was not interested in taking down our PO Box number and said she was truly sympathetic that we probably will never receive a postcard at this address.

We have to wait two weeks, she said, to not receive a postcard. And then I can then email her, and supposedly after we don’t get a postcard again she can prompt Google to correct their information.

Or, maybe we just start over and ask for another postcard we won’t get.

The reason? According to Gouri, there is a lot of fraud on the Internet with people trying to start up false businesses.

Cindy Vest and I opened that office on Morris Street in the Station House building nine years ago. Moving to a new office apparently makes the newspaper look like a criminal to Google’s fraud police.

So in protecting us, Google is telling our customers that we’re no longer in business.

When I told Gouri this is probably hurting our business, she gave me the email to their legal department.

We’ll just send them a copy of this newspaper.