Your Client Missed the LSA Call. Now Google May Still Charge Them.
If you manage Local Services Ads for local businesses, there’s an important change coming October 1.
And this one isn’t really about campaign optimization.
It’s about whether your client answers the phone.
Google has notified advertisers that it’s changing how certain Local Services Ads call leads are charged.
Starting October 1, 2026:
Missed calls during business hours may be charged as valid leads if the caller stays on the line for more than 20 seconds.
And there’s another change that agencies should pay attention to.
If the original call doesn’t qualify as a charged lead, but there’s a subsequent call between the customer and the business that meets Google’s valid lead criteria, that later call can be charged.
Google says the change is intended to encourage businesses to be more responsive to people trying to reach them through Local Services Ads.
That makes the operational side of LSA even more important.
You Can Optimize the LSA Account. You Can’t Answer the Client’s Phone.
This is something we think agencies need to communicate very clearly to clients.
You can optimize the profile.
You can work on categories, service areas, reviews, lead quality and bidding.
But if someone searches for an emergency plumber, calls your client and sits there listening to the phone ring, the agency can’t fix that inside Google Ads.
And Google already considers responsiveness when determining LSA ad ranking. Missed calls can negatively affect a business’s responsiveness signals.
So a weak call-handling process can potentially hurt in two places:
That makes answering the phone part of the marketing system.
What Agencies Should Do Before October 1
We’d recommend having a very specific conversation with every LSA client.
1. Audit Their Actual Call Coverage
“Do you usually answer the phone?”
Look at what actually happens.
How many LSA calls were missed during the last 30 to 60 days?
When are they being missed?
When the owner is on a job?
You may discover that the business is advertising during hours when nobody is consistently available to take the lead.
2. Check the LSA Ad Schedule
Your client’s LSA schedule should reflect the hours they can realistically respond.
Google specifically allows businesses to schedule LSAs for regular business hours, custom hours, or all day.
Running LSAs 24/7 sounds great when the goal is “more leads.”
It makes a lot less sense if nobody answers the phone after 6 PM.
3. Fix the Phone-Answering System
For businesses receiving meaningful LSA volume, having one busy office manager responsible for every inbound call probably isn’t enough anymore.
Depending on the business, that might mean:
Google does provide an exception for certain routing systems. If callers must press a key to reach the correct department, Google says the 20-second timer begins after the customer presses that key.
But the bigger issue remains the same.
Someone needs to own the lead once the phone rings.
4. Start Reporting on Lead Handling, Not Just Lead Generation
This may be the most important shift.
If an agency sends 40 legitimate leads and the client only answers 22 of them, that isn’t purely a Google Ads performance problem.
Your reporting should help make that visible.
It changes the conversation from:
“Why did Google Ads only generate X jobs?”
“Here’s what happened to the leads after Google generated them.”
That’s a much healthier client conversation.
LSA Management Is Becoming Operations Management Too
Google continues to push Local Services Ads toward businesses that provide a good customer experience.
And that means agencies managing LSAs increasingly need to look beyond what’s happening inside the ad account.
Is the phone being answered?
Are leads being followed up with?
Is the client staffed during advertised hours?
Can they actually handle the volume they’re paying Google to generate?
Because beginning October 1, those questions could have an even more direct impact on what your clients pay for their Local Services Ads.
And If You Don’t Want to Manage All of This Alone…
InvisiblePPC works behind the scenes as your white-label PPC team, helping agencies manage Google Ads and Local Services Ads for local-service clients under their own brand.
You keep the client relationship.
We help with the strategy, management, optimization and ongoing PPC expertise behind it.
So your agency can spend more time growing accounts and less time trying to keep up with every new Google change.
