Consolidated billing is a popular choice for agencies, resellers and large advertisers who work with multiple Google Ads accounts and want to streamline their billing by receiving just one monthly invoice. This feature also allows you the convenience of being able to move accounts to monthly invoicing, and from one invoice to another, without having to contact us. This article will show you how to find out whether you qualify to use consolidated billing, and how it works.
Requirements for consolidated billing
- To use consolidated billing you'll need to have, or create a manager account.
- All accounts appearing on one consolidated invoice need to be linked to one common manager account, known as the paying manager.
- You must use the monthly invoicing payment setting to pay for advertising costs. That is, you receive a line of credit from Google and pay down your costs according to agreed-to terms and conditions. If you don't use monthly invoicing, you might be eligible to apply.
- All accounts that will share an invoice must use the same currency. If there is more than one currency across the accounts you will receive one consolidated invoice per currency.
How it works
As you might know, in Google Ads there's a difference between a Google Ads account and an invoice setup.
Google Ads account |
Billing setup |
|
This is the account that you access when you sign in and it's used to create ad campaigns. A Google Ads account is connected to a single invoice setup. |
This is used to pay for products and services. You can use an invoice setup to pay for multiple Google Ads accounts. |
If you pay for multiple Google Ads accounts, you'll receive an invoice for each one. But if you put those Google Ads accounts on consolidated billing, you'll receive just one monthly invoice. On the invoice, you'll see the amount spent for each Google Ads account, the purchase order number and a total amount due. You'll only need to make one invoice payment to cover all your costs.
Here's a comparison of standard billing and consolidated billing:
Standard Billing:
|
One Google Ads account |
Invoice created for one account |
Invoice delivered |
Consolidated Billing:
|
Multiple Google Ads accounts |
Invoices consolidated for all accounts |
Invoice delivered |
If you'd like more detailed information about costs in each Google Ads campaign – clicks, impressions, adjustments or credits, for example – you can download a spreadsheet (in .csv format). We'll also provide a .zip file containing a monthly cost report, showing activity for each Google Ads account, making it convenient for you to report ad serving costs with each account you manage.
