Can you remove your agency from your Google Ads account?

Many business owners find out who controls their Google Ads account only when they want to leave an agency. It is better to know before you sign. Google's help pages describe the access levels and how to remove a user, and they point to one answer: whoever holds the Admin level holds the controls. This is general information, not legal advice. Read your contract and take advice if the position is not clear.

The access levels

Google's page on access levels lists five: Email only, Billing, Read only, Standard and Admin. Read only can view campaigns and use planning tools. Standard can do that and edit campaigns. Admin has everything the other levels have and, in addition, can give account access, change access levels and cancel invitations. Admin can also add or remove product links and review each user's authentication method and last login time.

Billing is separate. It can view and edit billing information, add or edit forms of payment and make payments, but it cannot view or edit campaigns. That means payment and campaign editing can be held by different people.

How access is removed

Google's page on removing a user says to open Access and security in the Admin menu, find the user and select Remove access in the Actions column. It does not say which access level is needed to do this, so confirm that in your own account before you rely on it.

The same page gives a warning worth taking seriously. If an account has only one administrator, that person's absence can leave the business without access to its tags. Google recommends having at least one other administrator.

What to put in the contract

My view, drawing on those pages, is that the contract should say three things:

1. The account is owned by your business, and your business holds an Admin user, ideally two.
2. The agency receives the level its work needs, for example Standard, which can edit campaigns without being able to change who has access.
3. You may remove the agency's users yourself on the last day of the notice period, and the agency will cooperate with handover.

If the agency wants to run your campaigns inside an account of its own, the pages I opened do not say how that account, its history or its data would be handed over. Ask for the answer in writing and put it to your lawyer. For the full set-up, including Analytics and Meta, see who should own your ad accounts, and for the wider contract reading see how to review an agency contract before you sign.

A disclosure

This site is published by Web Marketing International FZCO, which manages Google Ads for businesses in Dubai. I would set up an account in your business name, and you should ask any agency, me included, to commit to that in the contract. You can also score the ownership questions in the agency contract checklist.