Payment hold because you haven’t confirmed your personal information

There are a few occasions when we may reach out to you for personal information. One instance is when the AdSense payments team requires you to submit certain information in order to confirm your identity. When this happens, your AdSense account will have a temporary payment hold placed on it until you've confirmed this information.

How do I know if I'm affected?

If you're affected by this payment hold:

• We'll send an email to the email address you've specified in the "Payments > Settings" section of your AdSense account. This email will come from the payments team and will be sent from a Google email alias. In this email we'll ask you to provide some personal information.
• You'll see a red alert notification in your AdSense account which says that there's a payment hold on your account.
• On your "Transactions" page, you'll see that a payment has been issued to you but that there's also a payment hold on your account.

Frequently asked questions

What should I do if I’m affected? How do I get rid of the payment hold?

If you don't receive an email from the Google payments team via a Google email alias, you don't need to do anything. If you see the red payment hold notification in your account, but you haven't received an email from the Google payment team then please contact us via the button in the notification.

If you do receive an email from the Google payments team, via a Google email alias, that asks for verification of your personal information, please do the following:

1. Reply directly to the email.
2. Provide all the necessary information or, in some cases, a copy of your documents.

Please reply to the email with the necessary information within 5 business days. Note that you won't be able to receive any payments until you provide this information.

Why are you asking me for this information?

Sometimes, Google’s bank (or an intermediary bank) will require personal information to be verified in order to complete the AdSense disbursement process. Google does not store publisher information such as date of birth, nationality, etc., so when a bank needs to verify this information before processing a payment, we will reach out to you.

Note that not all publishers are affected by this payment hold. This process is more common in countries with a high rate of fraud.

What information are you asking me to provide?

We may ask you to confirm any or all of the following:

• Your date of birth
• Your country of birth
• The complete name of the payee listed on your account
• Your address
• Your nationality
• Your passport number
• Your national identity number

We may ask you to provide a copy of any or all of the following:

• Your passport or other government issued ID
• Proof of address (e.g., utility bill, bank statement)

What happens after I've provided my personal information?

Once you've provided the required information and it's been verified, the bank that asked for the information will complete the payment process, and the payment hold will be removed from your account.

Is my personal information being shared?

Please note that the information you submit to us may be shared with a third-party (our bank or intermediary bank) in order to complete the payment process. By replying to our email with the necessary information you acknowledge and agree that this information may be shared with a third party (our bank or intermediary bank). If you would like to know more about our privacy policies, please see the Google Privacy Policy.

Remember:

• Our email will always come from an official Google email alias. For example, [e-mail]. It will not come from an email address such as [e-mail].
• We will never ask you for your bank account details, so please be cautious of any fraudulent emails which may do this.