Troubleshooting Google Workspace

Steps to take if your custom email address stops working or you can't sign up.

Last updated January 27, 2025

This guide includes common error messages and troubleshooting steps to take when signing up for or managing Google Workspace.

To learn more about Google Workspace and custom email addresses, visit Using Google Workspace with Squarespace. If you haven’t created a Google Workspace account yet, visit Signing up for Google Workspace.

Note

If you’re still having trouble after following this guide, contact us for help instead of canceling your Google Workspace account. Canceling doesn’t allow you to start over, and it prevents you from reactivating Google Workspace through Squarespace.

My Google domain migrated to Squarespace

If your domain migrated to Squarespace from Google Domains, you may be experiencing one of these issues. 

I can’t access my Google Workspace inbox

This may be because your account is suspended, which happens when your subscription fails to renew. Squarespace is the new billing provider for your Google Workspace subscription, and you can manage your subscription in the Google Workspace panel. For more help, follow these steps to reactivate your account.

My domain and email forwarding broke

This might happen if your domain uses custom nameservers and you're using Google's built-in email forwarding services. Follow these steps to resolve the issue. It can take up to 72 hours for changes to take effect.

I can’t send or receive email in my account

If you can sign into Google Workspace but can’t send or receive emails, it's possible your:

  • Mail Exchange (MX) records aren’t set up correctly in your Squarespace domain or a domain you bought from a third-party domain host
  • Old MX records weren't deleted before the new MX records were added to your DNS settings
  • You added custom nameservers to your Squarespace domain and haven't added the Google Workspace MX records to your nameserver provider
  • Domain subscription isn’t active
  • Google Workspace subscription is suspended

The steps to fix these issues depend on who your domain provider is. If you bought a Squarespace domain through Google Workspace, your domain provider is Squarespace, and you should follow the steps in the Squarespace domains tab.

  1. Add MX records to your DNS settings in Squarespace, if you haven’t already.
  2. Ensure your domain subscription is active. If it’s not active, reactivate your domain.
  3. Confirm your Google Workspace account subscription is active. If your account was suspended, reactivate it.
  1. Ensure you know who your domain host is. If you aren’t sure, visit Who’s my domain provider?
  2. Sign into your domain host’s account to confirm your domain subscription is active.
  3. Add Google’s MX records to your domain’s DNS settings. For host-specific instructions, visit Google’s documentation. Remove any non-Google MX records, as having other MX records will prevent you from sending and receiving emails.

Need more help?

If you still can't send or receive emails after following the steps above:

  • You may need to wait up to 72 hours if you've updated or added new MX records. This waiting period is known as propagation time, or the time it takes for record changes to occur throughout the web. You can send an email from your Google Workspace email account to test if it's working.
  • Fill out this form so we can help. We'll respond and help get your email address up and running as quickly as we can.

I didn’t receive my free year of Google Workspace

If you’re eligible for a free year of Google Workspace for one user, but didn’t receive the offer, we may be able to apply the offer retroactively. For help with this:

  1. Review our eligibility terms to find if you meet our requirements.
  2. Ensure you followed the steps to claim your offer. If you're eligible, the price will adjust on the review page after you select your billing cycle.
  3. If you believe you meet the eligibility, contact us.

I can’t move my Google Workspace account to a different Squarespace site

Every Google Workspace account is connected to a domain. How you move a Google Workspace account to a different Squarespace site depends on if you bought your domain from Squarespace or a third-party domain host.

  • Squarespace domains - Move your Squarespace domain to another site. Your Google Workspace account should move with your domain. If it doesn't, contact us.
  • Third-party domains - Contact us so we can move your Google Workspace account to the correct site.

I received a warning email

We’ll send an email to your Squarespace account email address if there's an issue related to your Google Workspace account. You can follow the steps in the email to fix the issue. If error messages appear while setting up or managing your Google Workspace account, review our list of error messages in Squarespace or error messages in Google Workspace.

Credit card billing failure emails

If you receive emails from us noting that we’re unable to authorize payment for Google Workspace, update your billing information with a valid credit card to fix the issue.

If we can’t authorize the card after 14 days, your Google Workspace account will be suspended and you won't have access to your account. You'll have 40 days to reactivate the account before it's canceled completely and gets transferred to Google.

Other emails

Other emails you may receive have the following subject lines:

  • We couldn’t connect Google Workspace to your domain - Follow the steps below for the "This domain is already connected to a Google Workspace account" error message.
  • Google Workspace Registration Failure - Username in Use - Follow the steps below for the “A user already exists with this email” error message.

Error messages and notifications in Squarespace

You'll manage your Google Workspace account from the Google Workspace panel in your Squarespace site. To get there, in the Home menu, click Settings, then click Google Workspace. Below are common error messages that may appear. Skim the Error message column below, or use +F on your keyboard to search for the text of the error message.

Error message or notification

Next steps

A user already exists with this email. For more information, check your email.



This means: The user you’re trying to sign up with already exists. For example, if your username is:

  • An alias of another inbox.
  • The username of a group.
  • A recently deleted user. After deletion, usernames remain in Google Workspace's system marked as recently deleted for 20 days. During that time, you won't be able to give the username to another user.

To fix the issue: Follow one of the options below:

Option 1 - Use a different username

To sign up with a different username, log into your site and follow the same setup process, entering a different username in the User Name field.

Option 2 - Use the original username

To sign up for Google Workspace with your original desired username, set up the existing Google Workspace with a different username first.

  1. Log into your site and open the Google Workspace panel in Settings.
  2. Follow the same process as before, entering a different, temporary username in the User Name field. We recommend choosing a username you're unlikely to use for a second inbox.
  3. Click Purchase to create your Google Workspace account.
  4. You'll receive an email with login credentials for your Google Workspace user. Log in using the temporary credentials and follow the flow to accept Google's Terms of Service.
  5. Visit your Google Workspace Admin Console and click Start Setup to verify your domain. You can't change your username until you've completed this step.
  6. Rename your user to your desired username.
  7. Resolve the conflicting Google account.

Current email may not be on your Google Workspace domain.

This means: When this message appears under the Personal Email field during registration, you likely entered the same domain twice in the signup form.

To fix the issue: Try signing up again. Follow these tips:

  • User Name - Create the first part of the admin email address that will come before the @, like info, contact, or your name.
  • Select a Domain - Select the custom domain for your new email address. This will appear after the @.
  • name@example.com - Enter an email address you already use (like your personal email address), not the new email address you're creating. We'll send confirmation and instructions for setting up your account to this email address.

Emails must be formatted as username@example.com and can only contain letters (a-z), numbers (0-9), hyphens (-), underscores (_), apostrophes ('), and periods (.)

This means: The email username you entered doesn’t meet Google’s guidelines.

To fix the issue: Enter a different username that follows Google’s requirements.

Failed to Cancel Google Workspace

What this means: This message appears in your Billing panel if you're trying to cancel Google Workspace but don't have any Administrators in your Google Workspace account. To resolve this, set one or more of your Google Workspace users as an Administrator:

  1. In the Home menu, click Settings, and then click Google Workspace.
  2. Click a user.
  3. Check the Administrator option to give this user full administrative access on the Google Workspace account.
  4. Click Save.

You should now be able to cancel your Google Workspace account from the Billing panel.

Keep in mind, Google Workspace user levels are separate from Squarespace permission levels. A Squarespace user with Owner or Administrator permissions won't automatically have Google Workspace Administrator access.

Failed to remove user

This means: You tried to delete a user while your Google Workspace billing plan is suspended.

To fix the issue: Reactivate your suspended account, then delete your user.

Failed to update user

This means: The user you’re adding or renaming already exists. For example, if your username is:

  • An alias of another inbox.
  • The username of a group.
  • A recently deleted user. After deletion, usernames remain in Google Workspace's system marked as recently deleted for twenty days. During that time, you won't be able to give the username to another user.

To fix the issue: Log into Google Workspace and follow Google's documentation to free the username from the Google Workspace Admin Console.

Google couldn’t verify your domain

This means: Your domain isn’t verified for Google Workspace. Domain verification is a security measure to ensure no one else uses your domain with Google Workspace.

To fix the issue: Log in to your Google Workspace Admin console to verify your domain. If that doesn’t work, visit Troubleshooting Google Workspace domain verification.

Google Workspace Terms of Service

You have not yet accepted Google’s Terms of Service for using Google Workspace

This means: Your Google Workspace signup process isn’t complete. You must accept Google’s terms of service.

To fix the issue: Find your temporary password and log into your account to accept the terms of service.

Invalid domain name

This means: The domain you choose to use for your Google Workspace account includes special characters, like ü, é, or ñ.

To fix the issue: Choose a domain that uses valid characters according to Google’s guidelines.

Something went wrong

You’re using custom nameservers

This means: Old nameserver records weren’t deleted before signing up for Google Workspace.

To fix this: Ensure that you're using Squarespace’s default nameservers. Follow our steps in Troubleshooting domain connections to delete old records and add Squarespace's default nameservers correctly.

 

Squarespace is your new billing provider for Google Workspace

 

This means: Your Google domain and Google Workspace subscription have migrated to your Squarespace account.

When you're a Google Domains domains customer and your Google Workspace subscription migrates to Squarespace, Squarespace becomes your Google Workspace billing provider. You can manage your billing and users for your Google Workspace account from Squarespace after you confirm Squarespace as your new billing provider.

To confirm Squarespace as your new billing provider:

  1. Open the Google Workspace panel.
  2. Click Confirm

After you confirm, your subscription will be cancelled in Google and transferred to Squarespace. You'll receive an email from Google stating that your subscription was cancelled, and you can disregard this email. Your subscription will remain active in Squarespace and no action is needed on your end.

You will receive an email from Google

This means: You confirmed Squarespace as your new billing provider for a migrated Google Workspace subscription. Your subscription has been transferred to Squarespace, and was cancelled in Google.

When you confirm Squarespace as your new billing provider for a migrated Google Workspace subscription, you'll receive an email from Google stating that your subscription was cancelled. You can disregard this email. Your subscription will remain active in Squarespace after the transfer, and no action is needed on your end. 

This domain is already connected to a Google Workspace account.

This means one of the following:

  • There's already a Google Workspace account associated with your domain. It's possible someone in your organization already registered for Google Workspace through Google or another reseller. If this is the case, you can't sign up for Google Workspace through Squarespace using this domain.
  • You signed up for Google Workspace in the past and your account was suspended.
  • Another Google Workspace account uses your domain as the alias.

To fix the issue:

  1. Fill out this form to let Google know you're trying to sign up using a domain that already has a Google Workspace account associated with it. After you submit the form, Google will contact you with instructions and a CNAME record to verify you're the current owner of the account.
  2. Add the CNAME record to your domain. For Squarespace domains, log in to add the CNAME record. If you have a third-party domain host, log into your host account. After adding the CNAME record, wait 24 to 72 hours for the changes to process.
  3. Reply to Google's support team to confirm you added the CNAME record. They'll delete the previous account and let you know when it's deleted.
  4. Try signing up for Google Workspace.

We couldn’t register Google Workspace because of an error. We didn’t charge you. Try registering again. If the problem persists, contact us.

This means: There’s an issue with your domain, your site is connected to a Squarespace 5 billing plan, or a technical issue caused your registration to fail.

To fix the issue:

If none of the above applies to you, this could be related to a technical issue. Try signing up again. If this error persists, contact us.

We were unable to process your Google Workspace sign-up. Please try signing up again with a valid postal code.

This means: There was an issue with your postal code during account registration.

To fix the issue: Confirm you entered the correct postal code. Don’t leave the field blank if your country requires postal codes.

If this error persists, contact us.

Your account is suspended. Your account has been suspended due to a payment method failure.

This means: Your Google Workspace account was suspended because we weren’t able to charge the card you have on file for your site.

To fix the issue: Reactivate your suspended account.

Error messages in Google Workspace

The messages below may appear when you log into Google Workspace. These errors don’t appear in your Squarespace site. If the steps below don’t solve the problem, contact Google.

Error message

Next steps

admin.google.com is for Google Workspace accounts only

This means: You tried to log into a Google Workspace Administrator inbox, but you're logged into another email address, like your personal Gmail account. Regular Gmail accounts cannot be used to log into admin.google.com.

To fix the issue: Follow the instructions that match your situation to fix this error and log into your Google Admin console:

  • If this is your first time logging into your Google Workspace account, find your confirmation email and follow the steps to log in.
  • If the Google Workspace address you want isn't in the list, click Add account, and then log in using your custom email address, not an @gmail.com address.
  • If the Google Workspace address you want is in this list, select it. (Ensure it's not an @gmail.com address.)
  • For more ways to fix this issue and help logging into your Google Admin console, visit Google's documentation.

No license available for new user. You have reached the user limit for your organization.

This means: Instead of adding more users from the Google Workspace panel, you tried to add new users in the Google Workspace Admin Console without having any open seats.

To fix the issue: Add more users in the Google Workspace panel of your Squarespace site. When you add a new user from the Google Workspace panel, it automatically creates a license to this account for this user.

To learn more about how licensing works with Google Workspace, review Google’s documentation.

verifications@reseller.squa
respaceapps.com appears as an owner on my domain

This means: If you're using Google Search Console or Google Analytics on your site and sign up for Google Workspace with the same domain, this email address may appear as one of the owners of your domain.

To fix the issue: There isn't an option to remove or unverify that email, but this won't affect your Google Workspace, Analytics, or Search Console accounts.

We are sorry, but you do not have access to Gmail

This means: You tried logging in before verifying your domain.

To fix the issue:

  1. Ensure you’re logging into the Admin console: admin.google.com
  2. Ensure you’re not logged into another Google account.
  3. In the Admin Console, click Start Setup or try verifying your domain.

We are sorry, but your Google Workspace subscription has been suspended by your reseller

This means: Your Google Workspace subscription is no longer active.

To fix the issue: Log into your Squarespace site and reactivate your suspended account.

 

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