Google Guaranteed Is Gone, Meet Verified

TL;DR: Since October 20, 2025, every verified Local Services Ads advertiser carries one blue Google Verified checkmark, replacing the Google Guaranteed and Google Screened badges. Existing badges converted automatically, and the screening requirements are the same. The bigger change is that the consumer money-back guarantee was discontinued, with reimbursement requests honored only for jobs booked before December 7, 2025 and submitted within 30 days of the job. Bidding, budget, and lead volume are unaffected.

If you've been running Local Services Ads for a while, you probably built your listing around either the Google Guaranteed badge or the Google Screened badge, whichever applied to your category. Both are gone now. Since October 20, 2025, every verified LSA advertiser carries the same badge: a blue Google Verified checkmark.

What actually changed

Google folded its badging system into one. Instead of different badges signaling different verification levels across categories, there's now a single Google Verified checkmark for every advertiser who's completed the Local Services screening process, background check and all. The verifications you completed to earn your old badge still show on your profile, they're just presented differently now.

If you already had a badge before the switch, you didn't need to do anything, it converted automatically. New advertisers earn the Google Verified badge the same way advertisers always earned a badge: by completing the standard Local Services screening and verification process.

The part that actually matters: the money-back guarantee is gone

This is the change worth paying attention to. The Google Guarantee badge came with an actual money-back guarantee for consumers, Google would reimburse a customer up to a lifetime cap if they were unhappy with work booked through a Google Guaranteed provider. That guarantee has been discontinued. Google is honoring reimbursement requests for jobs booked before December 7, 2025, if submitted within 30 days of the job, but nothing after that.

For you as the business, this mostly changes what you're implicitly promising customers, not your day-to-day account management. But it's worth knowing, because a customer familiar with the old Google Guarantee might still ask about it.

What stays the same

• You still need to pass the same background check and license/insurance verification to get badged.
• The badge still shows on your Local Services Ads profile, and may appear elsewhere Google decides it's useful to consumers.
• Your reviews, response time, and other trust signals work exactly like they did before.

Nothing about your bidding, budget, or lead volume changes because of this. It's a trust-signal and consumer-guarantee change, not an account mechanics change. But if a customer mentions the old Google Guarantee, now you know why they might be confused, and what to tell them.

Full details are in Google's own documentation on the Google Verified badge.