Unable to begin setting up due to country and language

  • Resolved Rimas

    (@erku)


    1 month ago

    Hi!

    A friend of mine owns a WooCommerce e-shop, which operates from Lithuania, but could ship orders into pretty much any country, at least in EU/EEA, and he asked for some of my help today.

    The website, which is basically just the store, is multilingual (I think it uses WPML for that). It supports five languages at the moment: Lithuanian, Latvian, Estonian (all unsupported by Google Merchant Center), German and English (both supported). Naturally, Lithuanian is the default, at least so far.

    We would like to list his goods with Google. He has Google for WooCommerce installed, but is pretty much unable to do anything with the plugin, because it demands that we change not only the default language for the website, but even the business’ country of operations.

    I’m wondering if this is an intentional limitation.

    We both understand that Merchant Center does not support neither LT/LV/EE as countries, nor lt/lv/et as languages, but, as far as we both understand, it makes no attempt to prevent businesses operating from unsupported countries from shipping to supported ones, and using supported languages. From this perspective, the way the plugin acts at the moment looks like a bug.

    What’s also interesting is that the Merchant Center somehow receives updated product listings anyway, but we have no idea whether it’s this plugin at work (it’s been installed for a long time now, so maybe the limitation wasn’t enforced before?) or some other. Futhermore, the export happens in Estonian for some reason (again, not sure if this is an issue with the config that we can no longer reach, or just some automagic).

    How do we overcome this issue? Is there a way to disable or bypass the language and country check? Or maybe (and hopefully) this could and should be fixed in the plugin?

    The page I need help with: [log in to see the link]

Viewing 9 replies - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)
  • Plugin Support Zubair Zahid (woo-hc)

    (@doublezed2)

    Hello Rimas,

    Thank you for contacting WooCommerce support.

    I understand your friend’s WooCommerce store, operating from Lithuania, is having trouble using the Google for WooCommerce plugin due to restrictions around unsupported countries and languages in the Google Merchant Center.

    Please note that these restrictions are from Google. If a language or country is unsupported by Google Merchant Center, it will automatically be unsupported by the Google for WooCommerce plugin.

    The only way to make this work is to use a language and country that are supported by Google Merchant Center. For more information, please refer to this guide: https://support.google.com/merchants/answer/160637?hl=en

    Please don’t hesitate to contact us again if you have more questions or concerns.
    We are here to help ??

    Best regards.

    Thread Starter Rimas

    (@erku)

    Hi @doublezed2,

    I understand that you didn’t really get the situation: I’m not asking the plugin to support more languages or countries then Google does. The problem is that two of the languages used by the store, as well as a multitude of countries, are supported by Google, but because the main/home language and country are not, the plugin refuses to allow configuring the ones that are supported.

    I can’t find any indication on the webpage that you linked to that Google Merchant Center refuses to support businesses operating from Lithuania (it doesn’t) or using Lithuanian as primary language. The page talks about which countries and languages are supported by ads, but that’s not the same thing, is it?

    Thread Starter Rimas

    (@erku)

    To rephrase, I’m aware that there are target countries and languages that Google Merchant Center does not support, and Lithuania is among them. However, I’ve yet to see any indication that GMC supports same sets of countries and languages as both source (where goods are sold from) and target (where they are shipped to) though. Your plugin limits source countries and languages, and this sounds quite unreasonable.

    Thread Starter Rimas

    (@erku)

    While I’m still waiting for the response, here’s another question: why do I only see one language in the list of languages during setup, when, as I mentioned, the website, and the WooCommerce shop supports multiple languages via WPML?

    • This reply was modified 4 weeks, 1 day ago by Rimas.
    Plugin Support Zubair Zahid (woo-hc)

    (@doublezed2)

    Hello Rimas,

    Thank you for the clarification.

    I understand your store supports multiple languages, but since the default language is Lithuanian, Google for WooCommerce will use this language for the Google Merchant Center.

    If you review the “Supported countries and currencies” section on the Google page I shared, you’ll see that Lithuania is not listed for Shopping ads or free listings. This limitation comes from Google itself, not the plugin.

    If you have any other questions or concerns, feel free to reach out. We’re here to help!

    Best regards.

    Thread Starter Rimas

    (@erku)

    I see. In that case I’ll just remove the plugin and replace it with a different one, which has support for multiple languages and WPML.

    Plugin Support Zubair Zahid (woo-hc)

    (@doublezed2)

    Hello Rimas,

    Thank you for your reply.

    Could you let me know if you find one?
    It would be helpful for many WooCommerce users.

    Have a great day!

    Thread Starter Rimas

    (@erku)

    Sure, I’ve found one already.

    Plugin Support ckadenge (woo-hc)

    (@ckadenge)

    Hi @erku,

    Glad to hear it – thanks for letting us know!

    I’ll mark this thread as resolved now. If you have any further questions, I recommend creating a new thread.

Viewing 9 replies - 1 through 9 (of 9 total)
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