Consumer complaint received 2023-03-01
Company: Block, Inc.
State: GA
Product: Money transfer, virtual currency, or money service
Sub-product: Mobile or digital wallet
Issue: Unauthorized transactions or other transaction problem

Complaint:
Square ( service of Block, Inc ) is the current web payment processing service for our business ( XXXX XXXX XXXX ). They collect online credit card payments on our behalf and transfer them to our XXXX XXXX bank account after deducting their service fees. That process normally takes no longer than XXXX to XXXX business days. 

On XX/XX/XXXX, they collected a payment of {$1100.00} from XXXX of our customer 's XXXX XXXX card. We are yet to receive these funds. 

We conatcted their customer service team twice on XX/XX/XXXX and XX/XX/XXXX to discuss this issue at length and spent more than an hour the first day and more than XXXX hours the second day. Although they verbally ackonwledged the issue, they were not able to offer any kind of resolution and were not even able to escalate it to anyone else able to help on their end. 

Their confusion comes from the fact that the above transaction was linked to an invoice that had been partially paid starting on XX/XX/XXXX. Indeed, on that date, Square collected a 50 % deposit from these clients on our behalf amounting to {$1100.00} via a XXXX card ending in XXXX. Square inially suspected a credit card fraud and asked us to refund this money. However, such a refund could not be initiated from their web platform so we had to call their customer service. When XXXX did so, they changed their mind and advised that after a thorough review, that XXXX ending in XXXX had been cleared of any suspicions and that they would transfer the funds to our XXXX XXXX account. This transfer effectively took place on XX/XX/XXXX and they deducted their corresponding service fees. 

The clients then made their 50 % balance payment to pay off the invoice on XX/XX/XXXX using the same card. That payment was again held by Square on suspicions of fraud. This second time around, they collected the money ( which was showing on our Square balance ) but after 3 days of internal investigations, asked us to refund the money. We issued that refund immediately on XX/XX/XXXX and asked our clients to use another method of payment. The clients consequently made yet another payment of {$1100.00} using an XXXX card on XX/XX/XXXX. However, based on some very dubious reasoning, the Square customer service agent we spoke with today explained that the funds collected from that XXXX payment on XX/XX/XXXX were somehow being held to compensate for a previous balance on our account related to a refund. 
We then throroughly explained that there was never any negative balance on our account. The initial payment on XX/XX/XXXX was collected by Square and then sent to our bank account. The second payment was collected but then refunded - thus effectively canceled out. Thus, that XXXX payment was supposed to be transfered to our bank account. However, we simply never saw that balance on our account at any point nor received any type of communciations from Square regarding that XXXX payment and the funds they collected. 

In summary, Square ( Block, Inc ) is unjustly and unlawfully holding our hard-earned money without any valid explanation nor proper communication. From our standpoint, this is equivalent to an attempt to steal our money. Moreover, the fact that these funds haven't been made available exposes our business to legal actions from our customers due to a breach of our time-sensitive contractual agreements ( we have to organize an event for them on XX/XX/XXXX and have not been able to order our supplies yet because of this situation ).

Company response to consumer: Closed with explanation