Watch Now - Online Seller Education Series: Get Started with Square

[Andrés]

Hi Seller Community!

Thanks to everyone who was able to join the latest edition of our Online Seller Education Series: Getting Started with Square last week.

As promised, below I’ve attached links to the recordings so you can watch on demand, links to the Support Center articles for the topics covered, and answers to all the questions submitted during Q&A.

Part One Topics:

• Square’s Fees.
  • Video
• Hardware options:
• Contactless + Chip Reader
• Magstripe Reader
• Square Stand
• Square Register
• Signing up to accept payments
• Administrators vs Authorized Representatives
• 2-Step Verification
• Linking a bank account

Watch Part One

Part Two Topics:

• Accepting payments:
• Dipping and tapping a card with a Contactless + Chip Reader
• Swiping cards using a Magstripe Reader
• Manually keying-in card payments in the Square app and Virtual Terminal
• Sending Invoices online and from the Square app.
• How refunds work and processing refunds.
• Deposit options:
• Next Business Day
• Instant Deposit
• Scheduled Deposit
• Customizing your close of day
• Viewing payment fees and sales reports
• Viewing deposits and reports.

Watch Part Two

Q&A

Question: I’m planning on processing payments strictly from my phone via the Magstripe reader. If I use the Magstripe reader, don’t customers sign for the purchase on your phone directly? Wouldn’t that protect me from disputes?

Answer: While processing a card using a reader and collecting a signature from your customer is one way to prevent disputes, we do recommend few more ways to protect yourself from disputes when processing payments and using square invoices. 

Question: If you have the customer sign once, will that count for each time a charge is made, or do they need to sign every time to keep the 2.6% + 10¢ processing fee?

Answer: You should process a customer’s car using a Square reader whenever possible, both to help protect yourself from chargebacks, but also to process payments with a 2.6% + 10¢ fee. Payments taken by manually keying-in the credit card details in the Square app or using virtual Terminal cost 3.5% + $0.15 cents. Read more about our fees for manually-entered credit card payments and check out this guide for more context: Understanding Our Fees | Square Payments.

Question: Can customers use debit cards?

Answer: Yes, Square works with any US-issued and most internationally-issued magstripe or chip cards bearing a Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Discover, JCB, or UnionPay logo. View a full list of accepted cards.

Question: Do I need a separate email account for the business for receipts?

Answer: No. In fact, you never have to email yourself a copy of the payment’s receipts since you always have access to your entire payment history, including a copy of the customer’s receipt, in the Transactions section of your online Square Dashboard and Square app.

Learn more about viewing your payment history in our Support Center.

Question: Is the two step verification necessary for each transaction?

Answer: No. If you have 2-step Verification enabled for your account, you’re only asked to enter the verification code sent to you via SMS when signing into your account from the Square app or online Square Dashboard, not when accepting payments. You can also set this up to only request a verification code every 30 days.

Read more about 2-Step Verification.

Question: We have multiple locations. How will the deposit be labeled on our bank statement, will it show each deposit from each location?

Answer: If you’re having payments from multiple locations deposited to the same bank account, you can create deposit tags to identify where each deposit is coming from on your bank statement. Learn more about managing multiple locations and creating deposit tags in our Support Center.

Question: How do disputes work?

Answer: We have a full walkthrough of the disputes process in our Support Center.

Question: Do you need access to wi-fi in order to use Square? I’m working outdoors at a show where I may not have access to wi-fi.

Answer: When you’re using a Contactless + Chip Reader, you’ll need an internet connection from a wi-fi network or from a mobile device’s data plan. If you’re swiping customer’s cards using a Magstripe Reader, you can use Offline Mode, but do be mindful that payments aren’t processed in real time. If a payment is declined, there’s no way for Square to process the payment again.

Question: How do I match daily sales to my deposits?

Answer: Deposit totals and your daily sales can differ depending on the time of day a payment was processed. Square deposits payments taken Monday - Thursday before the 5:00 p.m. Pacific cut-off time the following day, but if any payments were taken after the cut-off, they’ll be included in your following deposit. You can see exactly which payments were included in your deposits from the Deposits section of your online Square Dashboard and the Reports section of the Square app.

You can also set a custom close of day time to bundle a day’s worth of payments into a single deposit, just keep in mind this delays deposits by a day.

Keep an eye out for more Online Seller Education Series coming soon!

Thanks again,

Andrés

Content Specialist, Customer Success

This post was edited by a moderator on August 26, 2020 to offer more visibility into Square's pricing.