My AdWords Compromised?

Hello,

I have been using AdWords for years now. In october 2005 I saw my charges increase over 60%. I thought great early holiday shoppers. My logs did not match but I was optimistic... November huge increase - still no match on logs. By the time I got my December credit card statement I went from $1800 a month to over $6000 a month and still no match on logs. I felt my account had somehow been compromised and opened another account with a new user name new password new email the works. Changed my conversion scripting and saw the first day all the clicks Google reported were in my logs, have not had a problem since the change. I have tried getting answeres on how this happened to no avail. I disputed only the charges I could not validate ($2800) . Now Google has stopped my AdWords completley and say until I pay the charges I disputed they will keep my account closed. I have been using AdWords for years at least 4 or 5, this has never happened before and I am not sure what to do. Can they ban me from free searches or Froogle while I try and work this out? Am I better off paying it and moving on now that problem appears fixed with the new account? Please help - I am at a loss for direction and have no idea what way to turn - thanks!!!

Harmony

First, welcome to the forums!

Here are my thoughts. If your business is very dependent upon Google ad words, then I would pay the bill, keep all of your reciepts, and then go about filing a case with Google. I would document everything you can, including printouts of your server logs, type up a very official letter on business letter head explaining the entire situation and include with that package all of the copies of everything and make sure it is all notorized - for whatever reason Google tends to respond faster and with more detail to anything that is in writing.

Those are my 2cents for what its worth, but please keep us posted on the entire situation.

J

Thank you for taking the time to reply. AdWords has been good to my business, I have printed all the logs. Thank you for the advice, it makes sense. It is the principle of the matter. I guess I have to question who needs to protect the account - my company or Google. I had a developer doing work from another company on my site at the time and built my Froogle feed. He used the same username and password after Google asked we all do. I feel I need to take caution and ask myself did I ask for the problem? How can i find out where those clicks ended? Any help - thank you!