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How to fix: Inconsistent value: Availability [availability] for MHLSF (basic)

For your merchant-hosted local shop front (basic), ensure that the availability in your local inventory data matches the availability displayed on your landing page

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When someone clicks a local inventory ad or free local product listing on Google, they expect to see the same availability on your landing page as they see in the ad or listing. You may be paying for wasted clicks if someone clicks on a product and then returns to Google because the product is not available for purchase.

  • Availability mismatches were found between your local inventory ads data and your landing pages. You should have received an email asking you to update your local inventory ads data by a certain date so that the values in your data are consistent with those on your landing page. If mismatching data is detected after this date, your account will be suspended and will no longer be eligible to serve local inventory ads and free local listings.

Instructions

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The merchant-hosted local shop front (basic) implementation shows the availability of a product at a specific shop. Accordingly, a click from a merchant-hosted local shop front (basic) local inventory ad must direct to a product landing page where a user can check the availability of a product at a shop. Your product landing page must display the same product availability value after searching for a shop.

Shop front type Feed source Availability attribute
Basic Local products inventory feed Availability [availability]
Step 1: Ensure that the availability in your inventory data matches the availability on your landing page
  1. Investigate your update process to see what could be causing the problem:
    • Check the warning email for examples of products that were disapproved. Look for a common problem in your product data that could cause availability mismatches.
    • Make sure that you're updating your landing page and inventory data at the same time. Schedule an upload or use the Content API to immediately update your inventory data. This scheduling helps to make sure that Google has the same data that is displayed on your landing page.
    • Make sure that your landing page explicitly indicates the in-store availability of the product. You can use terms like 'available in store' or 'in stock at shop' to show the product availability. If you don't want to explicitly indicate in-store availability, make sure that you indicate when a product is 'out of stock' in the shop.
  2. After you've addressed the problem, update the availability [availability] attribute in your inventory data to match your landing page.
Step 2: Resubmit your inventory data
After you've updated your inventory data, resubmit it using one of the methods below:
Step 3: Wait for your data to be re-crawled

Google will crawl the products listed in your Merchant Center account. If Google detects that your inventory data availability now matches your landing page availability, your account suspension will be lifted and you'll be able to serve local inventory ads again.

Tips

Compare inventory data to your product landing page
  1. Find the link [link] attribute for the example product included in your warning email.
  2. Open the link and search for the shop listed in your warning email.
  3. The availability displayed on this page must match the value submitted for the availability [availability] attribute in your local products inventory feed.
Example:
  • ID [id]: 7
  • Shop code [store_code]: 123
  • Availability [availability]: in_stock
  • link: https://www.example.com/products/7
If you're working with a third-party platform, some of these instructions may not apply to you. Refer to your third-party platform for instructions on how to resolve the issue or complete the task. Learn how to find support if you use a non-Google platform.

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