Google Guaranteed vs Google Verified: what changed, and what to do about your truck

Google Guaranteed no longer exists. On 20 October 2025 Google replaced it, along with Google Screened and License Verified, with a single badge called Google Verified, and ended the money-back guarantee that gave the old badge its name. A year on, thousands of trucks, websites and sales scripts still promise a guarantee that Google stopped honouring.

What the three old badges were

Google Guaranteed was the home-services badge: plumbers, roofers, electricians, landscapers, HVAC. Google checked the business, its licence and insurance, and ran a background check. In return the ad carried a green tick and a promise to the customer: if the job went wrong, Google would refund up to a capped amount. The badge sold itself to owners, because the ad effectively said "Google stands behind this business."

Google Screened was the professional-services version, for lawyers, real estate agents, financial planners and similar. Same checks, no guarantee, because Google was not going to refund a divorce.

License Verified was the lightest of the three, for categories where confirming the licence was the whole check.

Before

After

What Google Verified is

One badge, the same checks, no refund. A business that passes Google's screening and verification for its category shows the blue Google Verified badge on its Local Services Ad. If you were verified before October 2025, your badge switched over on its own. Nothing to apply for.

Two caveats. Google says the badge is not currently available for dining verticals, which its screening requirements page lists as Food and Beverage, Restaurants, and Dessert and Coffee. A restaurant can run Local Services Ads with no badge showing. Auto repair shops do get it, whatever you may have read elsewhere. And in many categories Google now runs pre-badge ads, which let a business take leads after the preliminary checks while the rest finish, placed below fully verified businesses. Both are covered in our verification guide.

What changed for the customer

The refund. Under Google Guaranteed, a customer who booked through the ad and was unhappy with the work could claim against Google. Claims closed on 7 December 2025 for jobs booked before the change. There is no Google-backed refund for anything booked since.

What the badge promises now is narrower and still worth having: Google checked that this is a real business, with the licence and insurance its category requires, run by someone who passed a background check. That is more than most directories check.

What changed for you

Less than you might think, and one thing more than you might like.

• The checks are the same. Licence, insurance, background check, by category. If you were through them, you still are.
• There is no guarantee to honour. The occasional claim that came through the old programme is gone.
• Your marketing is now wrong. If your truck, your website, your Google Business Profile description or your sales script says Google Guaranteed, it is promising something Google no longer offers. That can mislead a customer, and a competitor or a regulator can say so. Update it.

Does the change affect ranking or lead cost?

Google has not said that it does, and the ranking factors it publishes did not change with the badge: your bid, how likely your ad is to produce a lead, and the quality of your profile. The badge itself was never a ranking input, it was the outcome of the verification checks, which still count. In our own client accounts we did not see lead volume or cost move on the day the badge changed.

What may move is conversion. Some customers chose the Guaranteed badge because of the refund, and that reason is gone. The answer is the same as for everything else on Local Services Ads: more reviews, a complete profile, and a phone that gets answered.

Get a Local Services Ads audit › We check the badge status, the verification documents and the wording on your profile as part of every audit.

Common questions about Google Guaranteed and Google Verified