Sour side of Android/Google ID
Google products and services range from ‘awesome’ down to ‘wtf’ (*cough*Orkut*cough*), and their single signon/identification system ("Google Account") sits somewhere between the two.
On Android, just about everything is tied to a Google account. No big deal, I use Google Apps 4 Domains (GAFD) and I’ve used an email address associated with that to create a GoogleID which I use for Google Reader and other products.
To be honest, I was a little confused initially when the newly created GAFD account didn’t also create a GoogleID, but no big deal, I created my own. As far as I know, everything has worked – I even have a Google Checkout account. Even on the Android everything was working great, syncing contacts/email/calendar/etc, all was swell – until it got to the Market.
Using a GAFD based GoogleID doesn’t let you purchase apps. You can see the ‘buy’ button, but when you go to buy, it’ll go through an infinite loop of asking for a Google Account.
Midway through 2009, a Google employee responded to a help thread
At the moment, Google Apps accounts may not be used for Google Checkout transactions, so Android Market requires the additional login to a Gmail account that is used for payments. However, this doesn’t mean that users will need to wipe their phones. The rest of the phone itself is still tied to the primary account that was signed in at start-up; in your case, the Google Apps account.
They acknowledge the problem, and surely would have fixed it by now in 2010, right? Wrong. The user in that particular thread bought a Nexus One through his GAFD based account with Google Checkout, so it’s good enough to buy a phone, but not a $0.99 app? Great.
Sorry to hear you’re having trouble purchasing apps. It sounds as if you’re logged in with a Google Apps account. When prompted to enter the Checkout account, please be sure to enter a non-Google Apps account to ensure that the purchases can go through. Let us know if you’re had success purchasing since your post.
Hopefully this will help somebody else, but the only solution is to also add a @Gmail account. And even then, you better hope your carrier doesn’t block App purchases (like say.. Optus do)
