When booking with Square Appointments can my customer choose to save their card for later payment?

[carribatten]

I am a seamstress and due to the nature of my work dont often have set in stone prices because their are often too many variables to take into consideration before pricing a type of alteration.  Many of my clients that have booked online have assumed that when they input their cc information (for my no show policy) that it will be saved and they can use that when paying.  Is their a way they can choose to have their cc information saved at the time of booking so that it is possible?  I know of other scheduling apps that do this and was curious if Square was one of them or if its being considered for the future.  I have many clients that would actually like to have that ability. 

[EJ_]

Hi @carribatten

At this time, Square Appointments doesn’t support charging a client’s card on file, but our product team is working on it.

If the client were to enter their card info at booking, it could only be charged if you are requesting to cancel or mark the client as a no-show. 

However, since you'll need to check out customers with the Point of Sale app, adding cards to their Customer Profiles (which get created automatically when clients book appointments) will allow you to charge them going forward. 

Check out this article on how to enable this:

Use Card on File with the Square Point of Sale App

[Helen · Accepted solution]

Quick update! You can now add a client's card on file from your Appointments calendar. You can also use card on file to create a prepaid Appointment or to charge for a no show. If you have the Appointments app (iOS only) you can also now charge a card on file from the app.

Keep in mind if a client enters their card information when booking an Appointment with (e.g. because you require prepayment) this does not automatically save their card information on file. You'd need to add their card on file from your Customer Directory or the Appointments calendar/app as mentioned above.

[GleasonBeauty]

Clients are required to put a credit card on file before they can book an appointment. Yet, most of the time the card in not on their file after they have booked an appointment as a new client. 

Everytime I contact the client they tell me they have already put one on file and that the system required them to. 

Is there something I need to update or change? or is this some sort of bug that other people are experiencing?  Thanks for your time.

[nika]

Hey @GleasonBeauty. I moved your question to this thread so you can check out @Helen's Best Answer. She explains the card on file feature more in depth which answers your question.

[GleasonBeauty]

Thank you 😊 @nika 

[Rdstudiosd]

So my clients are booking through Instagram, and I know that it requires a card to put in to book the appointment, but when I click the appointment it says no card on file, does that still mean the information is still there though if they cancel within my cancellation policy?

[_Violet]

Hi @Rdstudiosd - Thanks for reaching out to us here on the Square Seller Community👋

Before you can charge a customer’s card on file, it must be added to their Customer Profile through either the Customer Directory or from a booked appointment. Your customers may have already paid for their Appointment at booking but did not opt into keeping their card on file.

You may find this Support Article helpful. It goes over the details on Using Card on File with Square Appointments. 

I hope this information answers your question but please do let us know if there is anything else we can help you with. Always happy to assist! 😊

[marge3]

just until recent.  there were 2 boxes when booking an appointment online that the customer had to check.  the second box was to keep that credit card on file for protection of no show.  it says you have no show protection HOWEVER if that cc is not on file. how the heck do you charge the card?!  you cant. so why say you have no show protection?  this USED to be a feature.  Im sorry it needs to come back.  I just noticed in the last 2 weeks, it is nov 2021 that new online clients cards were not on file any longer when booking. so I started an email to send for them to do a cc auth form.  they still don't get it! its like this system is too difficult for them. you should see the nasty emails from people on how they cant figure out how to add the card.  why are you making it so hard for us to protect us from no showing people.  

[Frida]

Hi @marge3,

We see you are new to the Seller Community, welcome! 😊

Have you set up a cancellation policy? With this set up, a card on file will be required in order to proceed booking an appointment. Double-check your settings to make sure you have the following set up:

First, you’ll need to set a cut-off time for cancellations:

1. Head to the Settings tab of your Appointments dashboard > click Calendar & Booking.

2. Scroll down to Cut-off time for allowing clients to cancel or reschedule > set a cut-off window.

3. Click Save

Note: Your cancellation policy will show in your online booking flow and at the bottom of the confirmation emails your clients receive.

Take a look at this guide when you have a moment, just to insure that all is set up correctly on your end.☺️

Let me know if this helps!

[fcservices]

Hello,
I have been using Square for over one year now.

When we started, when clients were booking online appointments with us while entering their credit card information for no-show protection there used to be an option for them to select "store my credit card information for future purchases".

Suddenly (since about a month ago) that option is no longer available. We don't recall changing anything in our settings and have not been communicated by Square about any changes in regards to that.
We get clients day in and day out now saying "you can use the credit card information I have entered while booking with you guys". However, this change now from Square's end is now creating friction with our client's experience.

And we do not want to require our client's to prepay their appointments so we simply would like Square to revert back to allowing clients to opt for storing their CC info or not.
I have been doing a lot of research on the topic and have also looked into everything within our Dashboard & Settings, and wasn't able to find any information at all about this change.
Please provide with an update / response asap, and hopefully with a work around the issue to restore back the convenience our clients once had.
Thank you!

[Drea245]

I don’t use the invoices feature. I just charge my clients at the end of their service. Now, when clients book an appointment I do have “No Show protection” which requires them to use to a card to secure the Appointment. Is there a way to use that same card to check them out? Like a card on file? It’s a little frustrating sometimes because they assume that I have that card on file and can just charge them but, there’s no option for it at checkout

[Helen]

This reply was created from merging an existing thread: Can you store a card on file in the mobile app?

@jessicahimes I've moved your post to this thread where another seller asked a similar question. Currently if your client provides a card at time of booking to comply with your no-show protection policy then that card information is not saved as a card on file. 

It sounds like this could be made clearer to your clients when they're booking their appointment with you, and I'll share that feedback with the Appointments team.

[fluteangel]

Guys you've got to be kidding me This was 3 years ago and this does not updated? What is the point of requesting a card on file to prevent a no-show if they're doing an online appointment and then you cannot charge them? My gosh you guys are living in the last decade. Tell me you have updated this! I just had a client book several sessions I was able to charge her the first one but I'm not able to charge her for the other ones, she just re-entered her card on file in her profile and yet it says no card on file. Seriously guys.... Please tell me you've changed this. I'm definitely looking for another way to fix things because you guys make it way too difficult and I'm looking for another option

[MedspaBecky]

I’m having a similar issue and it’s a joke. I had appointments request come in and the patient doesn’t have the card on file but others do. What is the reason for the inconsistency with this!!? What’s the point of collecting such information if it’s not even saved as a no-show protection feature? 

[fcservices]

Hello,
I have been using Square for over one year now.

When we started, when clients were booking online appointments with us while entering their credit card information for no-show protection there used to be an option for them to select "store my credit card information for future purchases".

Suddenly (since about a month ago) that option is no longer available. We don't recall changing anything in our settings and have not been communicated by Square about any changes in regards to that.
We get clients day in and day out now saying "you can use the credit card information I have entered while booking with you guys". However, this change now from Square's end is now creating friction with our client's experience.

And we do not want to require our client's to prepay their appointments so we simply would like Square to revert back to allowing clients to opt for storing their CC info or not.
I have been doing a lot of research on the topic and have also looked into everything within our Dashboard & Settings, and wasn't able to find any information at all about this change.
Please provide with an update / response asap, and hopefully with a work around the issue to restore back the convenience our clients once had.
Thank you!

[Kassi_]

Welcome back to the Community, @fcservices - 

The only way you would be able to charge your customers a deposit whenever they are making their appointment. 

If you'd like, the customer could reach out to you after the appointments to provide their card number before they arrive. It's not an ideal situation, but could be used as a workaround. 

I would be happy to tag this as a Feature Request for our Product Team. 

[fcservices]

Hi, Kassi.

I appreciate you getting back to me in such a quick turn-around.

However, I don't believe you fully understood my message, and I say this very respectfully. I'm not asking for anything new. This feature that I have described in my message (read: the ability for a client, while booking their appointment with us, to check a box saying that they would like to save the credit card information for future purchases) used to be available before by Square. And now it has simply disappeared. From night to day, this check box no longer shows as an available option for clients to check.

So I don't believe this is something that needs to be taken to the Product Team since it's a feature that was already available.

My point is, did I do anything in my business settings for the check box not to be displayed anymore to our clients while booking their appointments?

You mentioned deposits, but I'm not interested in charging pre-payments or deposits to our clients. We'd rather just keep collecting credit card information for no-show protection.

However, I most certainly would like to continue to provide that check box option to our clients for them to opt for storing the credit card information or not.

I hope this is more clear now, Kassi, and please let me know if it isn't and I would be happy to clarify further.

I appreciate your attention to this matter and investigating as to what have we done wrong in our settings or, mostly important, what do we need to do in order to correct this.

OR
If this is something that has been Disabled, what's the point behind it? It doesn't make any sense at all since through this feature every cardholder had an option to opt for storing their CC info or not.

Thank you!

[Kassi_]

Ah okay. Appreciate you circling back, so I can get to the bottom of this one. 

Right now, these are the only options when it comes to adding a Card On File with your Appointments. 

There isn't an option to add it during the online booking without a prepayment of some kind. The only option would be at the time of an Invoice, there is a checkbox to save the card.

[fcservices]

Can you investigate why the option I am enquiring about was removed?

[Kassi_]

@fcservices - 

I can tag this for our Product Team to take a little deeper for a future update.