Square for Retail Reviews

It is easy to set up and use. It is affordable and the customers never have a problem with it.

I wish they took bitcoin and the square terminal has quite a few quirks that should be worked out before charging that much.

In the past I've used traditional forms of credit card accepting machines and software provided by my bank. Very expensive and cumbersome. Square has made accepting credit cards cost effective and very easy. The retail setup has made keeping inventory easy along with sorting out sales taxes. The advantage of using AP on phone when not in store is extremely helpful and again very easy to use.

No real cons, If I were to get picky I'd say initial set up takes a bit of time but nothing really worth complaining about.

Square is free and easy to maneuver. With no experience, Square appointments made it easy to start my business and manage it. Customers can book on the platform and I can manage appointments and inventory, as well as run my website.

Square is easily the first choice for anyone trying to start a business. However, some features may seem a challenge to access without any guidance or guide. An example is learning about taxes being applied the first time I used the POS system. Coincidentally, the party I was conducting business with was a tax-exempt business and I had no idea how to bypass the tax.

People understand how to use it, so it's widely accepted as a valid method of payment and no one is nervous about using it (they should be!)

Square permits fraudulent chargebacks against your company. A client purchased multiple packages totally thousands of dollars from my company, received the services, and then disputed the charges as 'unrecognized'. I provided the following to square:
Her signed contracts, with an anti-chargeback clause
Photos of us performing the services at the event, with her in the photos
A chain of her emails, including an email after her event thanking us for job well done
Despite this proof and legally binding contract, Square sided with her and removed the funds from my account. I had to sit with my bank to file a dispute with Square, put a hold on all charges by Square, and start using an entirely different payment processor just to avoid Square stealing my money.

Absolute fraud.

Square pretty much takes all the leg work out of setting up a POS system for any business, but I'll speak specifically as a small business owner.
-If you're a first time small business owner, save yourself the headache and just go with Square; you might be able to get a lower merchant fees rate with another service, but then you have to deal with the hassle of setting up a separate POS register, possibly a separate app you'd have to setup on an iPad if that's what you plan to use, setting up the merchant account, etc. With Square, it's all wrapped into one easy setup.
-Easy to setup on an iPad, create a catalog of items to sell and process payments
-The item catalog screen is very user friendly and customizable
-Doing refunds is easy
-Reports are incredibly easy to run
-Square integrates with QuickBooks online, so it's been seamless to link all my Square sales to my accounting books and makes my tax filings much more accurate
-Creating invoices is also easy and gives a professional look to my invoice emails
-Ability to create forms that require signature, so no need for another digital signature service (unless you need more details, see Cons below)

-I wish you could have the same virtual terminal on the iPad on desktop as well. There have been times when my iPad crapped out and had to use my laptop, and it's not the same experience.
-If you're using the signature service for forms that you need to send out, it only records the signature itself and nothing else. Either it's a user error on my part, or they need to update it, but it needs more customization.

User friendly platform to load your storefront with products. Present templates that are also customizable to your liking. Integration of an inventory model to track what you have left on hand.

Have a plan for your products of offering multiple size and/or color options before entering on the site. It's much harder to edit and change the categories once it's set. Know what your page intent is as well ahead of schedule.

There are so many great features with the Square for retail. The ease of use is at the top of my list. It hooks up with my phone and never misses a beat.

I have not had any issues using this software. Even when I dont have a signal, it keeps the transaction in que and processes it when a signal is present.

I love how convenient it is to have this POS system for our business. We're able to set it up on the go and really able to make our customers feel comfortable giving us their credit/debit cards for processing payments. It's fast and great for our business

You need an internet connection for this POS system and it's not super cheap. However, the pros definitely out way any cons about this POS system.

Running a hire company, receiving payments on delivery is required on a daily, the square system is amazing can keep in your pocket and works every time. build quality is important it’s been dropped a few times and still works fine, also charge life is awesome, only needs charging every few months!

Fees, but you get fees with any eftpos option, bonus here is no monthly fee

Ease of use - Brand recognition by customers too - it's the 'go to' square and people know they can trust it, swipe it and ease of getting a receipt. Never had one complaint!

Reliance on wifi/mobile access- like all cloud based technology doesn't make it 100% reliable but that's the gamble. I found the website very cumbersome to set up.

The software is great to do all transactions, returns and exchanges. I like the fact that it prints a barcode at the bottom of the receipt so when a customer comes back for a return we just scan the bottom of the receipt and the transaction pops right up.

I end up getting the new square register in hope that it would act just like the retail app for the Ipad. The fact is that square won't update the new register. It has no exchange option like the Ipad app does and you end up needing to set up both the Ipad and register. Square has known about this issue for years now. You can see the complaints on the square forum page. Square also does not have a spot for barcodes so you end up having to put your barcodes in the sku spots. The loyalty point system also has some problems. When you do a return it doesn't automatically take points back from the customer account.

Square for Retail enables you to easily create an online eCommerce store, list your products, and sell them. It's quite simple to use, and this is perhaps what is the best reason to use Square. It is particularly useful for small businesses trying to build sales via social media and other online avenues. At the same time, it is useful for brick-and-mortar stores as well. While I use it for online sales, several of my colleagues use Square in their stores.

A big drawback is that Square (as of the writing of this review) is unable to process payments from outside the United States. Thus, if you anticipate worldwide sales, Square may not be the best solution for your business. A second drawback is that it can be difficult to reach a live customer service representative. Unlike most companies, in which one simply phones in for service, Square requires that you first create a trouble ticket (at which point you will be assigned a case number). You then use the case number when phoning customer service. It's not horrible but in today's business world it's kind of annoying and time consuming. Square also lacks live online help, which is another downside.

Easy to use! Download the App and get setup. I just recently bought their Square Register and it is awesome. Customer service will help you get the right APP for your business.

Been using their credit card device for well over a year and have never had any issues. There isn’t one thing i don’t like.

I absolutely LOVE the ease of use of Square! The app allows you to literally set up your shop in mere minutes, and then allows you to input your products with prices for an easy tap to add it to your customer's cart. I especially love the Square business card that holds all my funds, which makes keeping business money separate from family funds so much easier!

I honestly cannot think of anything that I do not love about this software. It is designed in a way that allows even the least techy person to set up their store and products, and go through a checkout seamlessly.

How simple it is to set up. You know exactly how much you are being charged. There is no hidden extra add ons. Square updated the os, so now if your customer wants to return 1 item and they purchased two, you just pull up the item and hit return.

Just make sure you do all the updates for square and os system for any pad you are using. We use an Ipad and it works great! Not much to not like.

Square easily handles transactions for our church book stall. It provides up-to-date inventory and online reporting for tax purposes. You can easily add sales, promotions, and other tailor-made functions.

What I like least about this software is the hardware. We utilize the Square Terminal, which was attractive as a portable register in that it takes credit cards via swipe and chip, but also prints receipts. The optional scanner is even nicer to use. However, for the scanner to work, the terminal must be plugged into an outlet, which robs it of its portable nature. Additionally, adding inventory via the Terminal is cumbersome and slow. Imagine typing in inventory titles using a small smart phone that is slower than a smart phone.

I enjoy easily keeping track of my customer's info, including the ability to create my own custom fields and also group customers. These features make it easy for me to note a history with a customer, aside from just their purchases. Grouping customers allows me to enter a location, find the group of customers there, and know everyones name as a result of this reference

I wish it were easier to transfer my client lest from other software, but thats the nature of software I guess.

The software is very easy to install. The pairing of the software with either the magstripe or the contactless reader is quite fast. Processing payments is a breeze and both readers can be used on the go or a set location.

I don’t have any problems with the software itself. It would be nice to have a better rate for card processing.

I love the app that goes with this product. I hold many pop up events for my shop and the square is fantastic for this. Adding inventory and processing payments is fantastic. I set up the app in very little time and thought it would take so much longer. I really like being able to use it with my phone and ipad and it has made payments so much easier. I will only use this software for my pop up shops.

Sometimes I have wifi issues, but they have a great feature that will still accept payments offline. So even though its a pain, I still receive payment later.

I like the ability to transfer inventory from one store to another. I like the ability to have employees clock-in/clock-out to keep track of pay and what items a specific employee sells. I like the ability to adjust quantities from the app instead of just the dashboard.

I don't like that I can't view another store's inventory from the app. Very often, I find myself saying, "We don't have that in-stock here, but I know it's in-stock at our other location." It'd be very helpful to be able to type in an item and view quantity in-stock for all locations. I also HATE that there are not "tickets" available anymore. I own a music store that offers instrument repairs and we also have special orders. For instrument repairs - the amount is variable depending on what needs done and I also notate the transaction with the instrument type, brand, serial number - what parts were used, and what was done under the "Quantity and Notes" section. I don't want to have to look up that information and type into a transaction with the customer standing at the register. In the other app, I could do all of that when no one was in the store and save it as a ticket. Then when they come into the store, all I had to do was pull up the ticket and they were good to go. Same with special orders. I don't want to add inventory into Square, assign it a price, add the SKU, put it into a category, set the quantity, etc., if I'm not going to STOCK the item. So for special orders, I like to just type in the information under "Custom Amount," but I do like to notate the transaction under "Quantity and Notes" with the title and SKU so I can look back and see what it was. I don't want to do that typing when a customer arrives, so I prefer to save it as a ticket. Now I can't do that.

I love how easy it was to start taking credit cards and to use Square as my POS. It syncs to my accounting software automatically and keeps track of all my products, invoices and charges.

There isn't an automatic section for shipping and I have to add it manually as its own category. Not sure why they haven't built this into their invoicing platform yet even though so many people have asked about this.

The Square plugin was super easy to use and fit most devices. The application is simple and adjustments were easy to make changes to. Paperless receipts are the best way to go about transactions.

The price was a little high for the software. Using the plugin had its disadvantages if you use a phone and that phone has a protective case. The application sometimes froze.

I love how it’s so easy to use and very user friendly. I have the Square Register which has a large screen for me and a small screen in the front for the customers transaction. It is easy to add inventory by name and barcode with the barcode scanner. You can set up alerts, and I can still use it for cash transactions. I have the cash drawer accessory so it opens as soon as soon as you complete cash sale. It is basically a very advanced and convenient cash register that isn’t large and bulky.

The price is a little steep for small businesses. You can get the system that requires an iPad but I didn’t see the point. If you don’t have an iPad you have to purchase that in addition. I settled for the standalone register.

The ease of use for this product is amazing. I love how you can make a sale with the virtual terminal by either swiping a card or sending an invoice.

The fees per use can be cumbersome. However all pay portals have some sort of fee to use their product.

If you are in an outdoor recreational type of business, Square works well because it does not require internet to complete a transactions. It's buffering capabiity provides 72 hours of time between a transaction and when it must be connected to the internet to "send" the transaction . This allowed us work near a riverbank where internet was not available and still accept credit cards. This was hugely important.

On one occasion, we had a transaction which billed double on the customer's credit card yet we only received payment once. Her bank directed her to us. Square's customer service was dismal. I ended up just eating the $150 transaction vs. attempting to work with them. Had I used a local bank, I think this would have been resolved with much more ease.