And still, losing google docs document sharing, and calendar, on the e-mail address identifier which will stay my valid and primary one is a hostile move, plain and simple.
The situation has been officially confirmed on their support pages [https://support.google.com/a/answer/1257646]:
" Impact to services after you cancel Google Workspace You lose access to core Google Workspace services, such as Gmail, Calendar, Meet, and more. You still have access to Additional Google services, such as YouTube, Google Photos, and Google Ads. "
"Support availability is rolling out to our G Suite legacy free edition customers over the coming days. If you do not currently have access to Support, please check back in a few days. We apologize for any inconvenience, but look forward to connecting with you shortly."
I look forward to some support for the service I've used for 15 years and what to tell the 5 family members who use "G Suite" (aka Google Apps) to handle email from my domain.
Do you know if there's a list of which services will/won't be avaiable after this process? Seems a bit random. Google ads but not gmail..but you can use gmail to point at another email service presumably? Can I still use the google apps I paid for? Does my user1@mydomain.com sort of work like it would if I'd use a hotmain account as my android account? But...if I did that, wouldn't I have access to gmail still? I sort of assumed you would but perhaps not.
One thing about G Suite accounts is Google never got around to making them act just like normal accounts; I cannot review android apps with my account, nor can I share paid-for apps with family members. Will this functionality magically appear after I cancel?
You can sign up for a google account with any email address, so if you'd never used GFYD you'd be able to do this no problem.
Over the last week I've gone through all of the steps of registering a new domain, setting it up with Google Workspace, sharing some docs back and forth, deleting the entire organization, and then signing up for a new google account using the same email address (so no gmail). After each step I waited 24 hours.
I was able to access Docs and share back and forth using this reused address on the new account. You'll obviously lose all of the existing share connections, but it's not like the address itself is burned.
> (Optional) Step 3: Delete your organization’s Google Account
> If you no longer want a Google Account for your organization, delete the entire account. Deleting your organization’s account frees your domain within 24 hours for use with a new Google Account.
Not totally sure the implications of that, it kind of sounds like you can create a clean slate where you can re-use that email address as normal? But not sure, it's confusing and I wouldn't count on it.
Which I'm not surprised about not being sure what will happen -- honestly for the last ten years, the implications and consequences of this legacy free "g suite"/"g aps"/whatever it is account have been continually super confusing and un-documented, and often seemed accidental on google's end.