Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

[Ani_]

Hi Seller Community!

I'm excited to announce the Small Business Administration has developed a partnership with Square to distribute the Restaurants Revitalization Fund (RRF) relief to the food and drink industry. The Restaurants Revitalization Fund (RRF) is part of the U.S. Government’s American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. This plan includes a $28.6B fund for awards to eligible food and beverage business owners, administered by the Small Business Administration (SBA). 

On Thursday, April 29th at 1:30-2:30 PM PST /4:30 PM-5:30 EST, we'll host a Live Q&A with the Small Business Administration (SBA) to answer any of your questions about the application process. Please make sure to ask any questions directly on this thread below. Keep in mind, the SBA will only be addressing questions related to the Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF), not PPP.  

How does the application process work?

We expect to start enabling applications for the Restaurants Revitalization Fund (RRF) on Monday, May 3rd at 12:00 PM EST. The award application program is owned by the SBA, and they are finalizing the process. We know how important these funds are to you and your business, so we are working as quickly as possible to get the application ready!  

Unlike the PPP program, the Restaurant Revitalization Fund are awards and are not loans. They are not serviced as loans, and have no forgiveness component. There are no intermediary banks involved. Awards are determined by and allocated by the Small Business Administration (SBA) and not Square.

If you qualify for a Restaurant Revitalization Fund grant, you’ll have the option to apply Monday, May 3rd on Square Dashboard or through the SBA’s secure website. To help support applicants throughout the process, the SBA will offer phone and district office support.

• Call center hotline (844-279-8898): Applicants can call this number for multi-lingual application or program support. 
• SBA District Offices: Applicants can reach out to their local District Office for tailored regional SBA support.

For more information about eligibility or to start your application, please visit the SBA Portal. You can also find more information about the Restaurant Revitalization Fund on the Support Center. Let us know if you have any questions for the SBA below!

Note: The SBA has announced that they will officially stop accepting applications for the Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF) on Monday, May 24, at 8 p.m. ET.

[OntheBeach]

When is the exact date and time that the Square application will go live?

[ChukE]

Monday, May 3rd at 12:00 PM EST. Is what they say

[Charlie_R]

When submitting corporate taxes, I am concerned because our Fiscal year ends 3/31...so our taxes begin at 4/1/19.  Should I also submit 2018 taxes that end 3/31/19?  And this these numbers are how award calculated, and we didn't use square until 2020 - should I include POS reports from our previous system Microsale?

[NmontaSBA]

Yes @Charlie_R. You may calculate your RRF funding amount based on either your fiscal year or calendar year. If you are providing fiscal year tax reports but you're calculating your funding amount based on the calendar year, please provide documentation of your calendar year gross receipts to ensure the fastest review of your application.

If you are using Application Table 3, you will need to document your eligible expenses on and between Feb. 15, 2020 and March 11, 2021, and your gross receipts on and between Jan. 1, 2020 and March 11, 2021.

[ThesisBeer]

Will the Square platform documentation be enough to show 33% of sales are on site, or will additional documents be needed? 

[Ani_]

@ThesisBeer Square will not be able to validate on site, we recommend you apply through the SBA to provide supporting documentation.

[OntheBeach]

Will the IRS form 4506-T be generated in the application process?

[NmontaSBA]

Yes, @OntheBeach. 

[PPastry]

How will Square know what type of business we are?  Will you have on all our dashboards a click here to apply?  Or will you just be looking at specific businesses?  We are a food truck.  Just not sure how you know what to load for what business.  Clarification on that would bring some peace of mind as we patiently wait until Monday.  Thank you

[Ani_]

@PPastry We will enable a link on the dashboard for all businesses we’ve identified we can help submit an application. If we can not help you apply directly, we’ve created an FAQ that guides you on how you can get information from your Square account to include in your application via the SBA. 

[Tom]

Important Update:

Hello everyone! Thank you to all who contributed questions and feedback today. Due to the high number of inquiries that came through, we've paused incoming posts on this Q&A thread. This will ensure that our teams within Square and the SBA are able to catch up on your concerns and address the topics that you raised. If you haven't received a reply yet, keep watch for an email notification from the Seller Community within the next few days.

Until then, you can also get more information from the SBA's website: Restaurant Revitalization Fund Knowledge Base. For any Square related questions, please visit our Support Center article on RRF FAQs.

Thank you for your patience with us as we continue to work on getting the resources you need.

[Ani_]

Hi! We wanted to check in and let you know that we'll be working on getting answers to your questions ASAP. Rest assured, all questions will be addressed. Thanks for your patience! 🙏

[foodheads]

Looking for info on RRF registration.  I was told by SBA that Square was a partner.  What's the scoop?

[Joe]

Hi there, @foodheads - thanks for reaching out and bringing your question forth here on the Seller Community.

A quick note - I've gone ahead and merged your post into an existing thread of Sellers who were also looking for information regarding the RRF program. We were previously doing a Live Q&A where SBA members were answering Sellers question in real-time. We have since paused this momentarily in order for them to catch up on volume.

As soon as the Q&A resumes, we will look to get you a direct answer. If not, you question may already have been answered here on this thread. 

[dineindude]

Square recently helped me apply for, and get approved for the restaurant relief fund. After waiting the period that was advised in the email for funding. I discovered that my application was canceled. i was not informed or aware of a cancelation for our grant. I have been on the phone 3 times with square support and they are telling me that they are working on my case and that they would be getting back to me. however it has been 2 days and I have not gotten a clear answer. is anyone else experiencing this complication. 

[MMG-Corp]

A corporate entity EIN owns 4 locations, each with its own EIN.

The corporate entity consolidates all restaurant sales/expenses and files tax returns on behalf all locations.

Each of the 4 restaurants received a PPP Loan,  using their own EIN number.

Do we need to file 4 separate applications, understanding that PPP loans were issues on a restaurant basis OR  do we file a corporate application on behalf all 4 restaurants (given this entity files tax returns)?

Also does Square allow other revenue streams (Door dash etc) to be included in the application?

[Joe]

Hi there, @MMG-Corp 👋 Welcome here to the Seller Community!

A quick housekeeping note - I've gone ahead and merged your post into an existing thread of Sellers who were also looking for information regarding the RRF program. We were previously doing a Live Q&A where SBA members were answering Sellers question in real-time. We have since paused this momentarily in order for them to catch up on volume.

As soon as the Q&A resumes, we will look to get you a direct answer. If not, you question may already have been answered here on this thread. We appreciate your patience!

[Anneise]

Just finished listening to the SBA seminar on applying for the RRF and my company qualifies for Option 2 (started in 2019 but not the full year and will need to provide average monthly sales x's 12.  I was using square for my catering invoicing prior to opening the brick and mortar but did not start with the Square POS system in my brick and mortar when we started taking sales.  Should I still apply through Square and if so, will I be able to provide additional information for my 2019 gross receipts if I wasn't using Square for my brick and mortar for the time we were open in 2019?

[Joe]

Hi there, @Anneise - thanks for joining us and asking your question here on the Seller Community!

A quick housekeeping note - I've gone ahead and merged your post into an existing thread of Sellers who were also looking for information regarding the RRF program. We were previously doing a Live Q&A where SBA members were answering Sellers question in real-time. We have since paused this momentarily in order for them to catch up on volume.

As soon as the Q&A resumes, we will look to get you a direct answer. If not, you question may already have been answered here on this thread. We appreciate your patience!

[lsakai]

Is it necessary to go through the SBA to register tomorrow if we're going to be using Square on Monday May 3 to file our RRF applications?  Do we pre register with Square on Friday?

Also - if the POS reports do not have the same Gross Sales amount as our tax returns and/or PL statements what do we do?  Most of us are probably using Doordash, Grubhub, etc for additional revenue.  Also will there be documents that we need to upload - like bank statements, tax returns.  The SBA recommends having everything ready to upload - but what will be required since we're using square.  Will the application be saved if we have to leave it for any reason - or will we have to start over.

Thanks

[AshleyK]

Hi! I've merged your post to our live Q&A board for the Restaurant Revitalization Fund. While it's no longer a live Q&A you're really likely to find the answer to your question in there. 

Have a nice day! 🙂