What Do I Do If My Square Account Was Deactivated?

If you are a small or medium business that needs to process credit card payments on a relatively smaller scale, then there are a wide range of options out there including Square. In fact, you may know Square as that plastic white or black card reader that you can easily plug into your smartphone or tablet and process a payment.

It is relatively easy to get a Square account, but unfortunately, it is not easy to come to terms when Square decides to deactivate your account. Over the last few months, numerous customers have registered complaints online about Square and how it deactivates accounts recklessly.

So, what are you supposed to do if you wake up one day and find that dreaded email notification from the company notifying you that your account has been deactivated? We're here to help you and make your life a little bit easier. Read on to find out.

Why and How Square Closes Accounts

In case you feel that you are the only one whose account has been deactivated by Square, you will be surprised at the number of results that you will get if you search "Square closed my account" online.

In fact, a simple Google search of that phrase returns more than five pages of related results. These aren't just five pages of search results but hundreds of thousands of people who are angry and sad.

But, it seems like there is no any real reason why these accounts were deactivated apart from the usual " Our team has reviewed your account closely and discovered a pattern of transactions associated with high-risk activity" tagline from Square.

Apparently, all those accounts were deactivated because they were perceived as high-risk. This happens even though all merchants are required to declare their business type during the account application process.

Therefore, nothing makes sense here, and it is easy to see that there is something sinister about the move. Unhappy merchants report the following recurring problems:

1. Square deactivates your account without any warning, and the only thing that they do is to notify you of the deactivation via an email. The email message proclaims that you are engaging in fraudulent activities of some kind even though you are an approved account holder and your business is 100% clean.
2. Once your Square account has been deactivated, payouts are suspended to your merchant account, and all your funds are held in a reserve account for up to 90 days. This is highly absurd, and it can even bring down your business if you don't have any other sources of income. Square spells out in its terms that they reserve the right to hold any amount of amount for any reason.
3. Perhaps, the most disturbing thing is lack of access to customer support to request an explanation as to why your account was deactivated. In most cases, you can't reach Square customer via phone, and your emails will most likely go unanswered. Therefore, you may never know what happened.

What Can You Do If Your Square Account Was Deactivated?

If Square has deactivated your account, you don't have to spend a lot of time moaning about it. The first thing that you need to do is to try and reach customer service for an explanation. If you are lucky enough, someone will reply to your email and guide you on what to do next.

However, if you find it difficult to reach customer support, you need to go out there and find a better alternative that will help you process payments. There are many high-risk merchant accounts out there that provide you with a wide range of benefits unavailable from payment aggregators such as PayPal.