Google today published a comprehensive help guide explaining how user access works inside Merchant Center for Agencies, formalising a permission architecture built around two distinct user types, three account setup configurations, and a label-based system for controlling which team members can reach which client accounts.

The documentation, which covers the feature now available worldwide after a phased rollout that began in the United States and Canada in March 2026, comes as agencies adjust to a centralised interface that sits above individual client accounts. The guide is specifically directed at Agency Admins - the senior user class within the platform - and covers everything from adding a new team member to linking a client multi-client account (MCA) and removing a user's access entirely.

Why the access model matters

The timing of the documentation is not coincidental. Google launched Merchant Center for Agencies in the US and Canada on March 11, 2026, and extended the platform globally on May 17, 2026. As agencies in markets outside North America come onboard, questions about how to structure team permissions - who can see which clients, who can approve account links, and how to prevent overreach - become immediately operational.

The access control problem in Merchant Center is not theoretical. In March 2026, a documented incident showed a former agency wiping a client's Merchant Center account simply by closing its own, because super admin privileges had never been removed after the professional relationship ended six years prior. The deletion took with it all product feeds, feed rules, supplemental feeds, and account links including Google Ads and Google Analytics connections. Google restored the account within 24 hours, but the episode made structural access hygiene a live concern across the agency community.

The new guide does not eliminate that vulnerability - it sits in a different layer of the system - but it does give agencies a formal framework for managing who holds what level of access within the agency account itself, and how those permissions flow down to individual client Merchant Center accounts.

Two user types, four capabilities each

According to Google's documentation, Merchant Center for Agencies introduces two primary user types: Admin and Standard.

Admin users hold comprehensive control. Four key capabilities define the role. First, full access: Admin users automatically receive access to every linked client account in the portfolio. Second, user management: they can add or remove other users from the agency account. Third, account linking: they can link and unlink Merchant Center accounts, and can request or approve links from the agency account to accounts the agency already owns, all from the "All accounts" page. Fourth, provisioning: they can grant linked account access to Standard users through a system called Labels.

Standard users operate differently. Access is limited by design. They can only view the portfolios for accounts they have been explicitly granted access to by an Admin. On the account linking side, Standard users can only link accounts where they already hold user-based access. They cannot initiate a link to a new account.

Client account access levels

The permission hierarchy extends beyond the agency account itself. When an agency user accesses a client's Merchant Center account, their permissions within that specific account can be set separately. The options are Admin access - full control within that client's Merchant Center, covering data sources, users, and settings - or Standard and performance and insights access, which is limited to view-only or restricted editing capabilities.

There is an important ceiling built into this structure. According to Google's documentation, "the maximum access level an agency user can have to a client's account is limited by the access level the Merchant Center for Agencies account itself has to that client's account." The practical consequence: if the agency holds only Standard access to a given client account, an agency user assigned Admin client account access for that client will still only have Standard permissions in practice. The agency-level access to a client sets the ceiling, not the floor.

Adding and removing agency users

The process for adding a new agency user begins in the "People and Access" page of the agency's Merchant Center account. An Admin selects "Add person," enters the email address of the new user, and then sets two levels of access simultaneously.

The first level is Agency Account Access - either Admin (full control over the agency account) or Standard (limited capabilities within the agency account). The second level is Client Account Access, which applies specifically to Standard agency users and determines the default level of access they will have to client accounts. Admin agency users automatically receive Admin access to all linked accounts by default. Standard agency users' access to specific client accounts is managed through Labels or by granting them access to all accounts.

Removing a user follows the same "People and Access" page. An Admin finds the user, selects "Manage," arrives at the "Agency user" access page, and in the "Status" section selects "Remove user."

Linking client accounts: three mechanisms

According to the documentation, there are three distinct methods for connecting a client Merchant Center account to the agency.

Direct linking is the standard path. An Agency Admin navigates to the "All client accounts" page, selects "Add an account," fills in the client's Merchant Center ID, and selects "Next" to initiate the linking process. The same steps apply to linking a client's multi-client account (MCA). Sub-accounts within a linked MCA can inherit labels assigned at the parent level, but individual sub-accounts can also receive additional specific labels that override or supplement the inherited ones. Unlinking works from the same "All client accounts" page - the Admin locates the relevant account and selects the "Unlink" icon in the "Remove link" column.

Automatic account linking is a faster path available under specific conditions. The connection is automatically approved if the person making the request already holds Admin status on the merchant's account. Accounts linked this way appear immediately in the "All client accounts" page. The process is the same as direct linking up to the final step, where "Request link" is selected instead of waiting for a manual approval. If the agency user holds only Standard access to the client's Merchant Center account, the merchant's own Admin still needs to manually approve the connection.

Requesting access is the third path, relevant when the agency does not yet have a relationship with the client's Merchant Center account. The agency must specify which of two access levels it requires: Admin (full administrative control) or Standard and performance and insights (standard access combined with visibility into performance metrics). Once the request is sent, the administrator of the merchant's Merchant Center account is notified in two places - by email and through the "People and access" page under the "Partners" table. The merchant can approve or reject the request. If approved, the agency receives exactly the access level it requested. If rejected, the "All client accounts" tab updates to show the request status as "Rejected."

One point the documentation makes explicit is that after a link is approved, individual agency users are not listed on the merchant's "People and access" page. The client retains control at the agency level, not at the individual user level. They can view all linked partners and remove access at any time from the "Partners" section of the "People and Access" page. This means that merchants dealing with the scenario documented in March 2026 - where an agency retains access long after a relationship ends - can revoke access at the agency level without having to identify and remove individual users one by one.

Three setup options for different agency sizes

The documentation describes three named approaches to configuring the agency account, which it calls setup options.

Universal setup is the simplest. All team members are added as Admin users. Every user automatically receives full access to every linked client account. The documentation identifies this as best suited to small agencies where all team members need access to every client and granular permission controls are not required.

Permission control setup divides the team into Admin and Standard users. Standard users can be assigned either Admin-level or Standard-level access across all client accounts - but the key difference from Universal setup is that some team members are designated as Standard rather than Admin at the agency level, introducing a basic tier separation. The documentation describes this as best for small to medium agencies where all team members still require access to every client, but where some control over administrative privileges is wanted.

Advanced setup, also described as role-based access with labels, is designed for larger agencies that need to manage which team members can access which specific client accounts. Labels are the mechanism. An Agency Admin creates a label - examples in the documentation include "High priority" or "Clients - Region West" - and assigns that label to specific client accounts. Standard users are then assigned to one or more labels, granting them access only to the client accounts that share a label they are assigned to. Agency Admins are not restricted by labels; they retain access to all client accounts by default regardless of label configuration.

How labels work in practice

Labels are the technically distinctive element of the system. They are the only mechanism that allows an agency to assign a Standard user access to a subset of client accounts rather than all of them.

Agency Admins can create, edit, and delete labels from within the agency Merchant Center account. Labels can be assigned or changed for individual users or in bulk. Editing a label changes its name or description. Deleting a label removes it from all client accounts and revokes access for any Standard users whose access was based solely on that label. The documentation notes that a confirmation is usually required before a label can be deleted.

For multi-client accounts, labels can be applied at the parent MCA level. Sub-accounts within the MCA inherit those labels. Additional labels can be applied directly to individual sub-accounts, supplementing or overriding the inherited ones. An Agency Admin can view and manage both parent MCA links and individual sub-account links and labels from within the agency Merchant Center account.

There is a specific edge case worth noting: if a client account's last label is removed, the agency retains the link to that client account - access is managed by the overall linking, not by labels. However, access for Standard users who relied on that label would be removed.

The permission ceiling within labels

Standard user permissions within a specific client account are determined by the client account access level defined for that user - either Admin or Standard. But the overall agency access level to that client remains the ultimate limit. A Standard user assigned Admin client access to a particular client is still bounded by what the agency holds on that account. Labels control which accounts a Standard user can see; the access level determines what they can do once they are inside.

Community reaction and open questions

The publication of the guide comes against the backdrop of visible industry interest. On LinkedIn, practitioners have reacted to the broader Merchant Center for Agencies rollout with a mix of enthusiasm and unresolved questions. Jordy de Boer called it a "huge addition for onboarding clients," noting that it makes the overall process "more aligned and more logical" compared to the previous situation where agencies could invite clients for Ads but clients had to take their own initiative on other platforms. He also flagged a feature gap: the same centralised onboarding logic would be welcome in Google Tag Manager. Alex Mansour, who helps agencies onboard clients, asked directly whether the feature would be available through the API - a question that touches on whether the permission architecture can be automated at scale. Ginny Marvin, Ads Product Liaison at Google, was tagged in that query, though no response was visible in the thread at time of writing.

The API question is not a minor one. According to PPC Land's coverage of the Merchant API, Google designated Merchant API as the primary tool for programmatic access to Merchant Center accounts when it announced general availability in August 2025, setting August 18, 2026 as the shutdown date for the older Content API for Shopping. Whether the Merchant Center for Agencies permission model - including label assignment and user management - is exposed through Merchant API is a question with direct implications for agencies managing dozens or hundreds of clients who would want to automate onboarding rather than perform it manually through the interface.

Where this fits in the broader Merchant Center picture

The user access guide arrives at a moment when Merchant Center is central to an expanding range of Google surfaces. As PPC Land reported in May 2026, Google announced AI performance insights for Merchant Center covering AI Mode, AI Overviews, and the Gemini app - with rollout planned across five markets. Product data quality in Merchant Center now affects shopping ads, AI Mode listings, virtual try-on in Google Lens, and the Business Agent, simultaneously. That concentration of surface area on a single data source makes account health management - which Merchant Center for Agencies is specifically designed to surface across a portfolio - more consequential than it was two years ago.

The feature is currently available on a limited basis and may not apply to all users, according to Google's own documentation. Agencies that do not yet hold an agency account must contact Google directly to request access. Existing agency account holders access the interface at merchants.google.com, where the agency view is the default.

Timeline

  • August 2024 - Google completes the mandatory rollout of Merchant Center Next to all retailers, establishing the technical foundation on which the agency layer is built. (PPC Land)
  • December 23, 2024 - Google publishes the Merchant Center Next glossary, defining Multi-Client Accounts and documenting the access control system for permission levels. (PPC Land)
  • August 2025 - Google announces Merchant API general availability; Content API for Shopping is set for shutdown on August 18, 2026. (PPC Land)
  • March 6, 2026 - A former agency wipes a client's Merchant Center account by closing its own, deleting all feeds and account links. Account restored within 24 hours. (PPC Land)
  • March 11, 2026 - Google makes Merchant Center for Agencies generally available in the US and Canada, giving marketing firms a single dashboard to manage multiple client accounts. (PPC Land)
  • May 17, 2026 - Google announces the global rollout of Merchant Center for Agencies, extending the platform beyond North America. (PPC Land)
  • May 27, 2026 - Google announces AI performance insights in Merchant Center, covering share of voice across AI Mode, AI Overviews, and the Gemini app. (PPC Land)
  • June 25, 2026 - Google publishes detailed help documentation on managing user access in Merchant Center for Agencies, covering Admin and Standard roles, three account setup options, the automatic account linking mechanism, and the label-based permission system.

Summary

Who - Google, publishing documentation for Merchant Center for Agencies; and digital marketing agencies that manage client Google Merchant Center accounts, particularly those with multiple team members requiring differentiated access levels.

What - A comprehensive help guide detailing the user access architecture for Merchant Center for Agencies, covering two user role types (Admin and Standard), three account setup configurations (Universal, Permission control, and Advanced/label-based), the four mechanisms for managing client account connections (direct linking, MCA linking, automatic linking, and access requests), and the label system that allows Standard users to be scoped to specific subsets of client accounts.

When - Today, June 25, 2026. The underlying platform launched in the US and Canada on March 11, 2026, and went global on May 17, 2026. The feature is currently available on a limited basis.

Where - Google Merchant Center Help Center, accessible at merchants.google.com for existing agency account holders. Agencies without an account must contact Google to request access. The feature and its documentation are global in scope.

Why - The documentation formalises the permission model for a platform that is now globally available, giving Agency Admins a reference for structuring team access across large client portfolios. It arrives against a backdrop of documented access control failures in the standard Merchant Center environment, where agency users have historically retained permissions after professional relationships ended - with consequences ranging from unintended account closures to clients unable to remove super admins they had never intended to grant elevated access to. The label system, in particular, addresses a structural gap: the ability to scope individual team members to specific client subsets without requiring separate login credentials or manual account-by-account access management.