enpitsulin

Background#

Because I wanted to develop a Chrome extension, I registered for a developer account. I remember that Google developers require a $25 registration fee.

At first, I didn't know that you could register directly in China, so I used a virtual credit card. To my surprise, starting from 2021, developer accounts require identity verification. However, the virtual credit card has a random U.S. address, which is unfortunate. I spent money but couldn't use it. I can only think of ways to apply for a refund.

PS: Developing a Chrome extension doesn't require this $25 developer account, you only need to spend $5 to register as a Chrome Web Store developer and that's it 😪

Contacting the Developer Support Team#

After some searching, I found that you can directly use this form to contact them.

Please select from common questions or applications and choose "I want to cancel my account and request a refund."

I entered some detailed questions, and within 1-2 working days, I received a reply like this:

Obviously, because I didn't verify the developer account, I couldn't do it. However, the email provided a form link to contact the verification team.

I filled in the relevant information, described my situation in detail, and submitted it after translating it with chatGPT because it had to be in English.

Received Refund Information Email#

Communicating with the verification team is usually simple; you just need to confirm that you want to delete and refund. However, in the middle of it, because my Gmail is linked to two other Gmail accounts, I accidentally replied from the default one, which wasn't the email I used for registration.

So, the support team pointed out that I needed to add a cc to the email used for registration in subsequent emails. Then, I sent the confirmation information from that email, and basically the next day, I received the refund information email.

Then, after a few days, the refund will be credited back to the card.