Beating a Dead Horse but it needs to be: Preauthorization

[FarmAndBar]

We need to be able to preauthorize credit cards when running a tab. Period.  We really enjoyed the low buy in and easy menu development and a couple of the other features, but a bar/restaurant needs to be able to run a tab and preauthorize a credit card.  I've gone back and looked at conversations about it and it appears that this has been a CONSTANT request by users that has gone ignored.

I'd like to know why it isn't available.

[#2]

Pre-Authorization for Bar Tabs Update ⭐
Hi everyone - I'm Hadley, from the F&B product team. First of all, thank you SO MUCH for continuing to share all the feedback here over the years, we know how important the Bar Tabs feature is. For anyone who is not aware, this feature is currently in beta in the US for both Square Point of Sale as well as Square for Restaurants POS. 

➡️ If you use Square POS, here are instructions on how to get started beta testing. 

➡️ If you use RST POS, you can join the beta community here and our beta team will enable feature to your account. You can find the support article for getting set up on RST POS here. 

As a reminder, when a feature is in beta, there is still some engineering work happening to iron out the smaller bugs and optimizing the experience for our sellers and their customers. If you choose to participate in the beta testing, please share any feedback (good or bad 😄) to our beta team at betafeedback@squareup.com so we can learn how it is working for you and your staff.  

Thank you!

[bhoth]

Please add me to the list re: the need to do pre-authorizations to verify a credit card is current and to take away from the CC available balance.

Thank you

[Chad]

Hello @Brixandhops, welcome to the Seller Community! 

Currently Square doesn't have the ability to run a preauthorization for cards. This a feature request that we're currently tracking. 

The only work around I can think of is creating a Customer Profile in your Directory and using Card on File. This would allow you to save a customers card to charge for later, but you would have to create a profile for each customer you have which might be a lot of work for a fast paced restaurant. 

If you have any questions please let me know! 

[ChesterGapWines]

I have the same request.  Opening a ticket with a credit card swipes the customer's name, but states "CC will not be saved for purchase"  Would be very helpful.

[DaoDeJing]

I strongly suspect that Appointments isn't really part of the Square system. Considering how many other incompatabilities Appointments has with Square Register/POS, it appears to be a seprate system that Square interacts with via API or something.

If I'm correct, then unfortunately the fact that something is a feature on Appointments doesn't necessarily mean it would be easy for them to implement it with Square Register (and vice-versa).

[DaoDeJing]

You can add me to the list of those requesting a pre-authorization method. It clearly already exists in the system, it's just a matter of implementing a subscriber user interface to it.

I'm sorry to say that it seems Square's feature roadmap isn't very concerned with what customers want, but rather with what lucrative contract business partners want (like Apple for official register hardware). But hopefully I'm wrong.

[Old_Saco_Inn]

Hi Sean - any further update on a pre-authorization function? Like many others we use Square for our lodging and restaurant business, and pre-auth would be a huge improvement for us both in a reduction of fees (less card-not-present transactions) and increased convenience to our guests.

Thank you.

[Chad]

Hello @Old_Saco_Inn, welcome to the Seller Community! 

Currently credit card pre-authotization's are still a feature request at this time. If I hear anything I will make sure to update this thread! 😀

Sean moved to another team within Square a couple of months back. 

[foolishthings]

We're in the same boat.  We're about to add alcohol to our cafe menu and LOVE Square, but will have to move to a different POS if we can't save a card in the system.  All this is to say, I'm adding our business to the "us too" list

[Psycho60usa]

Hello - any updates to this request?

[Russell]

Hey @Psycho60usa - welcome to the 👥 community. 

I don't have any update on this, but I'll be sure to let our Product Team know you are also looking for this feature.