[New] Square Refund Policy Update

[sashafatl]

Hi Sellers! 👋

We wanted to inform you of an upcoming change to Square’s refund policy which will be effective as of April 11, 2023. 

Occasionally, we update our policies and pricing for our products to better align to evolving costs from our network and payments partners. In these scenarios, we make pricing changes so that we can invest in our platform, create new features, and continue expanding the value Square provides to sellers like you.  

Processing fees will no longer be refunded to your account when you issue full or partial refunds to your customers.

We are making this change to reflect that Square incurs processing fees from our network and payments partners in instances of refunds, and to match current industry standards. You do not need to take any action and there will be no change in the experience for your customer. 

You may wish to update your return policy for your customers in order to account for this policy change. We recommend visiting our Return Policy Guide & Templates for guidance on how to create a return policy that works best for your business. You can also find additional information on the refund process through Square by visiting our Help Center. 

In addition, we've modified language in our taxes and indemnities provisions in the Square General Terms of Service and Square Payment Terms related to our legal obligations.

Read more about the upcoming pricing and policy changes here ›

Thank you for selling with Square.

[DLRosenberg]

My question is we are having huge lags within our inventory where an item will be out of stock and yet it's allowed to go negative- forcing us to refund the client. I don't feel like we should be liable for paying double fees when the oversell is due to Square.

[MayaP]

Hey there @DLRosenberg this is really great feedback and I completely understand the predicament here. I will make sure this review is passed along to management so they are aware of the effects these changes have. I appreciate you for reaching out and sticking with us through these changes! 

[Donnie-M]

I think this is great feedback and a real world example of how a policy change impacts us specifically.  I would like to chime in and say that maybe a good compromise would be an allowance each month for the one off refunds that fall into a category like this.  Or a monetary allowance for refunded fees, but that preserves the spirit of the policy change without penalizing sellers.

I don't like the term industry standard in this case myself, but I get it.  If 90% of the market share is doing it, it is no longer a differentiator.

[Richmenlooks]

We process hundreds of online orders a month with an average price of $300. Some customers place their order and will later reach out to cancel their order for whatever reason. Are we still going to be charged for orders that aren't fulfilled and shipped? 

[Donnie-M]

@Richmenlooks Short answer from what I understand is yes.  As I have said to someone else, I would just change your policy that cancellations will be refunded less a %5 restocking fee/return fee etc.  In your case, a 300$ order online is about 9$ exactly, and to me that is not a trivial amount to be taking on.  I do know that alot of companies don't actually charge the card till the order is shipped.  I would like to see square for situations like yours allow the pre-auth/hold and then release when the order is fulfilled so you could avoid this fee.  If the person is a good customer you can always choose to waive the fee, but if they order and just cancel they probably aren't going to buy anyway.

[PFGlamping]

I use square for my Glamping tent rental bussiness, each booking has a security bond of $150 that I refund once I have collected all of the equipment. This charge is going to be huge for me as it applies to each booking. My only other option is to ask people for their bank account details and refund them directly... but this will be time consuming for the guest and myself, is there another way to collect a security bond?

[Donnie-M]

@PFGlamping The simple way to fix this for you is to add 5$ to the price of your rental to cover the 5$ cost to refund the $150.

I am by all means not getting into the decision by square, but in your case where you are always doing a refund this is the minimum I would do.  Otherwise I would just put it as a $150.00 deposit but just say there is a 5$ non-refundable fee if using a credit card for the deposit.

I focus more on things I can control than the ones I can't.

[JTPets]

I closed my shopify account for this exact policy. Square should consider how much they take from users already in subscription fees and user fees and balance that with how many outstanding issues and features have not yet been implemented or addressed.

1: I pay a fee for debit

2: I pay a fee for credit

3: I pay a fee for hardware

4: I pay a fee for accepting and doing my own deliveries

5: I pay for web hosting services

6: I pay for addons

At a certain point, using square with integrated payments is going to become more costly than using 3rd party, If square was in financial trouble I could perhaps see this as justified, but they are not and it feels like a money grab

[bkrass1]

Typically we catch refunds before the transfer takes place, which would seemingly avoid the costs Square says it is trying to avoid eating. Will the new policy affect these too, or only once the transfer has taken place? Thanks.