Side Income Journal

How to fix you already have an AdSense account issue

How to fix you already have an AdSense account issue

This post I am writing from my own experience. If you are not doing anything fishy, you might be able to recover your AdSense account. If you are, and if you are trying to trick Google, I can’t help you :)

A brief introduction:

I have started one YouTube account with my wife more than a year ago. YouTube needs 4000 watch hours and 1000 subscribers to start monetization. We got 1000 subscribers pretty quickly but it took us quite a long time to react for 4000 watch hours.

Finally, we got the monetization and YouTube sent us a mail that we can apply for monetization for our videos.

We were excited. We applied for it and Boom !! it got rejected.

What is the issue here:

The main issue is that you need an Adsense account to monetize on YouTube. Both are different subsidiaries of Google. And, Adsense has its own rules. One important rule of Adsense is that you can’t have more than one Adsense account. You can have only one account. If you have created one years ago and you forgot what it was, then forget applying for Adsense, you will make it more complicated.

YouTube uses Adsense to release the payment. So, we need to register on Adsense. If you already have an Adsense account, then it will be easier for you. You can simply connect your existing account to your YouTube channel. Also, if you don’t have an Adsense account and someone in your family has one, you are free to connect to that account as well. But, never create a duplicate account on the same person’s details.

If you had one account before and you closed it, logically, you can create another account. But I have seen people claiming that their application got rejected even after the old account was closed.

Why our application got rejected:

We applied on my wife’s name as she does most of the work on that channel. And it was rejected with the following message:


You already have an AdSense account Thanks for your interest in AdSense. Did you know you already have another AdSense account that you could use? AdSense only allows one account per person. To get started with AdSense, you can either:

  1. Continue using your existing account, associated with c…@gmail.com. If you can’t access this account, follow the steps in our login troubleshooter.

or 2. Close your other account(s) by following the steps in the Help Center article. Cancel your AdSense account, and then try signing in again.

We look forward to seeing your ads up and running soon. Thanks, The Google AdSense Team


4 years before, I have applied adsense for one of my website on my wife’s name. It was rejected and we forgot about that. It was rejected, so it is not a valid Adsense account, right? But, as per adsense, NO. They tries to record everything, even if you are not joining their program, they wants to record that too.

So, I thought it is fine, if Adsense is considering that old account a valid account, I will reapply using that. I reapplied with the old gmail account. But, I got the same mail again and it is pointing to the new account.

  • I can’t deactivate any of these account because both are not actually valid Adsense accounts. These are only rejected accounts.
  • There is no option to deactivate or close as all options are disabled.

Adsense options disabled

You can’t click on any of these options.

I got this mail on morning of our wedding anniversary. We had plans for that day but we cancelled everything. She spent years to build that channel and we were waiting for this day for a long time.

My first approach: Contacting Google support:

Adsense or Youtube doesn’t provide any direct help for anything related to Adsense or Youtube. You will get live chat feature only after you are in YouTube partner program.

My first approach was Google’s support forum. Add a new question on Youtube support forum mentioning your issue.

Note that no one in these forum works for Google. But, there are experts who can contact Adsense team. I don’t want to mention their name. But if you search for old questions, you will find them.

It takes time. You need to wait for few days to get it solved.

My second approach: Contacting YouTube on Twitter:

YouTube support team has one twitter account @teamyoutube and they are active on it 24/7. I was not expecting this !! I tweeted them and got a reply that they are looking into it. Next day, I got another tweet and asked me which account I want to keep. I shared the account id and within one day, it was fixed :D I can’t express you how happy I was. I tried four days continuously and finally it was fixed.

By the way, I got one reply from an expert on Google support group that she also contacted YouTube team to help me on this. I thanked her and asked her to close that and also explained what just happened.

So, if you are in this loop,

  • Don’t open a new account on your name or anyone’s name.
  • Don’t keep applying.
  • Have patience and take help on Twitter.

FAQ 1: Can I use the same AdSense account for my websites:

Yes, you can use the same account for your websites or any web products. This is what Google recommands. You will get the same error if you try to create a new account for your websites. It requires approval for your website and you don’t have to verify your identity, current address again.

FAQ 2: Can I check YouTube earnings on AdSense dashboard:

No, AdSense stopped showing earning from YouTube on their dashboard. You can check your earnings on YouTube studio.

FAQ 3: Can I link the same Adsense account with more than one YouTube channel:

Yes, you can. And, this is what you should do. If you are creating another channel and if this channel is ready to join YouTube partner program, you can link your existing Adsense account.

FAQ 4: Can I use any other advertising network on YouTube:

No, you can use only Adsense on YouTube. You have other ways to earn money like you can use affiliate marting, create and sell your own product etc. But you can’t use any other advertising network.

So, that’s all I want to say. If your problem is solved, please drop a comment below and let us know what worked for you.


Written by Kaush who loves to write side income ideas and other productive tips.

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