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]

Pre-Authorization for Bar Tabs Update ⭐
Hi everyone - I'm Hadley, from the F&B product team. First of all, thank you SO MUCH for continuing to share all the feedback here over the years, we know how important the Bar Tabs feature is. For anyone who is not aware, this feature is currently in beta in the US for Square for Restaurants POS. 

➡️ You can join the beta community here and our beta team will enable feature to your account. You can find the support article for getting set up on RST POS here. 

As a reminder, when a feature is in beta, there is still some engineering work happening to iron out the smaller bugs and optimizing the experience for our sellers and their customers. If you choose to participate in the beta testing, please share any feedback (good or bad 😄) to our beta team at betafeedback@squareup.com so we can learn how it is working for you and your staff.  

Thank you!

[PizzaVero]

We're in the process of evaluating systems to replace an aging Micros system as well as an aging Future POS system. The feature set of Square is superficially impressive, but when you start drilling down into issues that are important to bar/restaurant operators Square has significant shortcomings. The lack of meaningful response to this issue says lots. Perhaps its an issue of PCI compliance, but the many posters here have not been given a satisfactory response. 

Time to give a closer look to Clover and NCR Silver

[Helen]

Thank you for your post @PizzaVero, I'm sorry that Square doesn't meet all the needs of your buisness yet. We can track feature requests here in the Seller Community but we can't share exact timelines or guarantee that a particular requested feature, like the ability to pre-authorize a card, will be available.

We really appreciate your feedback and if you have any more feature requests or improvement suggestions for existing features please let us know.

[karma37]

The title of this thread has been edited from the original: Hardware of Register and Square Stand

Does Square Register and Square Stand able to keep bar tabs open with Name and C.C. on screen throughout the day. Like Aloha and other P.O.S. systems. Need to keep tabs open..

Thanks

Peter C.

[ryanwanner]

Unfortunately Square doesn't allow for holding a tab open with credit cards at this point.

You can run open tickets and create a tab, but unless you physically hold onto the card there's no way currently.

This is a heavily requested feature here on the community, though, so hopefully.......?

The only way around it currently is Square's Card on File feature: you create a customer, enter their card info, then assign it to the ticket. It's cumbersome at best in a busy bar environment, though.

[ChrisCC]

Just to further the importance of this and give an example more extreme,  I’m a concert venue with 5 bars and 2 stories.   People often start tabs at the bar near the entry and rarely return to that bar throughout the rest of their experience.  About 85-90% of tabs start here.   If everyone had to go there to close when the show ends it would be awful.   I use square at another small location and this is the single thing that stops me from installing it at all locations.   I believe because square is a 3rd party processor, there is a legal roadblock to storing card info whereas a merchant processor is allowed to.   Thanks 

[Veritasi]

Are there any updates here.

We are currently using Square for Restaurants in one of our Cocktail Bars.

We are opening another high volume bar and this will be a necessity for us to use Square there.

It's, pretty much, a standard restaurant/bar feature that's missing.

[ChesterGapWines]

This is a MUST have in a future update.  Not sure what is taking Square so long to implement this feature, which is available on other platforms.  Square - help us out here before we have to jump ship!

[kbt1979]

This reply was created from merging an existing thread:  Refundable damage deposits or a credit card hold

As Square is still not able to do a refundable damage deposit or a hold on cards, what is everyone using as a solution. Should I be using another service. We are a wedding venue that charges after an event for excessive clean-up or damage and with 3 homes on property that require refundable damage deposits. I would actually prefer a hold because it's an undo burden if they cannot fork over the exact amount or want it creating interest by sitting there. I just would like to charge them IF something happens.

[Release]

It's not practical to create and send invoices for us each time.  I want to be able to add a $200 refundable deposit to each order automatically.  Short of that, I want to be able to list the deposit as an item (as a workaround), but require it when also ordering our main product.

[Bar2]

We are having the same problem at our bar not being able to check the card and pre auth. We are going to get into trouble when that tab can't get paid. I hate to leave square but this is a hugh oversight.