Removal of Google Workspace Enterprise Licence from a user that has left the business

[PhillipHill]

If I remove a Google Workspace Enterprise Licence from a user that has left my organisation will all of their historical data (eg. emails / google Drive) be deleted? 

Their physical user account will still be retained - just wanting to know what happens if I remove the Workspace licence... 

This is because we need to free up some licences but there is a potential risk that we may need access to the users email/google drive at a later date and so I figured we could just re-add the licence if we needed the data at a later date??

[KevinApodaca · Accepted solution]

Archived User licenses are designed for this purpose. To retain user data and the account after the individual has left for compliance / legal / policy purposes. That is the recommended approach for this situation.

One quick example, If you remove the user license, you remove their coverage for Vault, which is what applies retention policies to user data.

[PhillipHill]

Many thanks for this - how do I go about assigning an Archived User Licence please?

[StephenHind]

@PhillipHill sign in to https://admin.google.com and go to Billing > Subscriptions and add a new subscription.  Choose the Google Workspace add-ons option and choose the Archived User licence you need and start paying for the licences

If you're with a Partner you need to ask them to add and pay them for the licences.

[SergioAlvarez]

If you remove the license, the acount will get locked up, you will not be able to use the data and the seat will still be taken, the seat is the number of users you can have at all times, so if someone joins the company, even if you have available licenses, you will not be able to use them if you do not have seats.