While most SEOs know when to use Google’s remove URL tool, there are some people who don’t understand when they should and shouldn’t use the remove URL tool.

John Mueller answered a question about whether someone should remove the HTTP version of a site via Google’s remove URL tool when they are migration a site from HTTP to HTTPS, after they do all the canonicals and 301 redirects.  And the answer is definitely not!

no, the URL removal tools are only for temporary, urgent issues, not for normal site maintenance / migrations.

Many SEOs consider the remove URL tool for emergency situations where a page needs deindexing immediately for security or privacy issues, not just usual site maintenance.

I have seen some webmasters accidentally remove important URLs when trying to remove duplicates with a / on the end of a URL, or accidentally remove an entire site when they improperly try to remove a non-www domain because they want the www version indexed.  Some “penalties” people see where a site is seemingly de-indexed, which many believe is for spam reasons, is the result of someone not knowing how the remove URL tool works.

If you want a brush up on the remove URL tool, Google has a support page here.