> Take another look with a free trial account?

I'm not OP, but I tried that in a bake-off a few months back. Setup went well, I got some free trial credit-- and immediately found my account turned suspended due to fraud concerns. Note that this was the same payment details I was using (and continue to use) for Google Apps for Domains.

If GCE can't get the simple things like billing handled, I've got little faith in their ability to solve the harder problems.

Curiously, a few months later (this week in fact) I got a message out of the blue telling me that my account was unsuspended. Rather obviously, I had already gone with AWS around mid-summer...