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]

It IS FOR SURE COMING!! 🙂 they’re running beta testing on it now, so hang in there, I almost switched, glad I didn’t because I really do like the company but this definitely has been and issue that’s cost me hundreds of $$. Hopefully testing goes well and it rolls out soon 🙂

[leejoramo]

We need this feature, as well. It's odd to have so many "of the moment" features like Apple pay and contactless credit card payments, but to have to put someone's physical credit card in a filing system like some ratty old back woods diner. Don't get me wrong-- I grew up on ratty old back woods diner food, and have some nostalgia for it, but that's not what we're about. If it were, we would just have a cash register and an old credit card machine. Also, what is the purpose of swiping a credit card through? We can just type a name in...or put it on an index card and keep it in our own system like a ratty old back woods diner.

[msmola]

This reply was created from merging an existing thread:  Can Square be use to run a Equipment Rental business

I am looking to open an Equipmet Rental business and was wondering if anyone has used or knows if Square can be configured to run this type of business? Thanks

[DrumBrew]

We are actually looking at other POS options like LAVU for the sole reason that they hold the card info while the tab is open. People don’t like having us hold their card and it’s a hassle to sort through a box of cards when we need to close a tab. We like the square system much better, but at the end of the day it’s about the customer experience, and the inability to hold card info will probably result in us going with another POS system.

[Helen]

@msmola You could use Square to track your sales — but at this time you can't collect a security deposit or pre-authorize a card to hold a deposit. We're tracking this request in this thread so I moved your post here.

[eastender]

Hi Tom,

We've been waiting for this feature to come on-line for a while now, and as soon as it does, it'll make our lives SO MUCH easier.

Our issues are:

- Customers leaving cards behind, and then we have to manage a weird lost and found of what is currently about 100 abandoned cards. we close the tabs at the end of the day's business, as we would if there was no physical card left behind.

- We're adding a food provider to our brewery taproom that will run a separate square entity. So if someone opens a tab with beer, we have to give them back their card if they want to use it to buy some food on the other side of the room. Awkward and weird for the customer, and in a busy room, we stand a good chance of getting stiffed by someone, since all we have is their name. 

- As mentioned elsewhere here, the time it saves closing out a tab, not having to do another swipe... this is HUGE for us, as it all bunches up at the end of the night. So many swipes... that could be made just once when it started.

I don't think a pre-authorization step is even needed here. Just collect the number in the record as you do with the name, and let us use it to process payment when we close the ticket.

Hope this helps!

Cheers,

Scott

[Tom]

Hey Scott (@eastender),

Thank you for taking the time to share your experience. Appreciate your thoughtful insight about the additional food provider and tips—we don't want any of our sellers to miss out on their fair share. In addition, that's a lot of abandoned cards—thanks for sharing that metric.😬

I went to check for any updates that may assist with improving these issues but there still aren't developments that I can access for this kind of setup. That being said, I'm going to make sure our Point of Sale Team sees this.

Please don't hesitate to let us know if anything else comes up and keep in touch.

[aenimal11]

Just another data point for you, @Tom. I own a brewery and we've been happy with Square for the 2 years we've been using it, but there are new POS systems (Arryved) out now that are competitive with Square and don't require my employees to store customers' credit cards. We've seen some of our peers switch to it and they've recommended we do the same. I would hate to abandon Square, and I don't want to have to buy new Android tablets, etc, but we're strongly considering doing it, especially since it seems Square has no intention of addressing this inadequacy.

[tee_]

A new Client just scheduled an appointment a month in advance for about $300 worth of services.

I do require a card on file for no-shows and cancelations.

However, she’s now stating 24hrs after she scheduled her appointment that there are some pending transactions on her credit card.

I was wondering, to verify the card is active, does Square do “test” authorization transactions?

I’ve never had anyone claim this has happened to them before .

[GlassJudy]

At this time, Square does not do pre-authorization of charge/debit cards, so any pending transactions on your customer's card are not from Square.  Here's a link to a thread where this issue is discussed and some work arounds are given in case you do want to do so.

[VanKalkerFarms]

wow, that's a lot lot lot more expensive.  

$299

12x $19.95 = 239.4

.54% more = $3,780

$.19 *8,000 = $1,520

so that would be $5838.40 more to switch to clover at those prices.  and that's not even counting my custom rate for volume with Square which saves an additional $500 or so.