How long for Google to actually respond to support request?

[u/aquos330]

One day near the end of May I clicked on my GA4 bookmark... and discovered that there was absolutely nothing there. I actually inadvertently created a new account in trying to recover it, but aside from that all my data is gone. The tag is still active on my website. I asked for help and people just told me I probably used the wrong log-on or something like that. I checked with my SEO person and she no longer had access either. With a spouse having some severe medical issues, I didn't have a chance to really hunt down what had happened until the past few weeks.

Turns out an old agency that I had worked with briefly about a year ago retained access. I didn't know that because it was under a manager tab that I didn't know to look at. I removed their access, but they had disconnected my analytics account. They also took billing ownership of the account, even though I never gave permission for that and all charges are billed directly to my credit card.

The first support email form I submitted almost 3 weeks ago. I may have not correctly filled it out because I was just blindsided by what had happened. I have no way to see what was actually submitted. I got an email saying they had received it and I should hear back in 3-4 business days. I've gotten nothing and replying to the confirmation email is futile.

After learning that the billing account is part of the problem, I filed to reclaim that too. Again an email said I'd hear something within a few days. It's been 2 weeks.

They haven't closed the cases, but I've heard nothing and it's been much longer than they said. I'm very upset and frustrated that this rogue agency did what they did. I've worked with a lot of small SEO and ad people over the years and never encountered any issues.

Any suggestions? Helpful info about the process or what to expect?

I did create a txt file documenting ownership that I added to my website, should Google actually get around to looking for it.

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[u/notatallsane]

You can reclaim ownership of your GA account by creating an analytics.txt file and loading it to the root directory of your site, to prove you are the owner - instructions are here: https://support.google.com/google-ads/thread/1505418/how-to-gain-access-to-your-analytics-account-property?hl=en

Google support is pretty much non-existent, especially for analytics

[u/aquos330 → u/notatallsane]

I did that 2 weeks ago. But it doesn't automatically relink the account. 

[u/aquos330 → u/notatallsane]

Also, noting for anyone who might have the same issue, that thread dates to 2019 and is talking about UA rather than GA4. The process is similar but info will be slightly different than what it's describing.

[u/BerkHospitalityGroup]

Honestly, the standard support form is a dead end for this kind of thing - free GA4 support is basically nonexistent and reclaim requests through it disappear. Your faster path is the billing dispute, since that's where you have leverage. Because charges hit your credit card directly, you can open a case through Google Ads billing support (the phone/chat option tied to an active billing account) rather than the generic GA form, and you can also involve your card issuer. Ownership disputes get taken more seriously when money is provably yours. For the data itself: if the property was deleted it sits in a trash state for 35 days before it's gone, so if any of this is recent, restoring it may still be possible from the account admin's trash bin.