Square Point of Sale Reviews

Pros

The most important aspect of Square Point of Sale is the ability to set up monthly, quarterly, and annual recurring invoices. Its shocking other solutions don't offer this, or only offer it at VERY high levels of monthly investment. This is a user-friendly solution for my business and is easy to understand, set up, and get rolling right "out of the box."

Cons

The address book makes it a bit tough to set up the clients as a business, it's a bit more geared to selling to consumers. But I've been able to create a workaround to make it work for me (business name in one of the name fields). I also really would like to integrate Square better with QuickBooks but I think QB is the problem - QB is notoriously difficult to work with (VERY difficult!).

Alternatives Considered

Zoho CRM, Stripe Billing and QuickBooks Online

Reasons for Switching to Square Point of Sale

Primarily I chose Square because of its easy interface, quick time to launch, address book set up, but mainly because of recurring invoice functionality.

Pros

Easy set up. The set up tools were not distracting, had a way to see where you are in the process, so you don't miss anything.
Ease of deployment. My employees are of varying ages and tech experience. This product was easy to teach to my users.
Clients know the name Square. They trust their information is secure. They are also impressed with the NPC ability to tap to pay with our phones.

Cons

The readers may not be necessary. I thought at the time of setup that I needed 5 readers, so I could have saved myself an initial investment. We are a fully mobile company, so our POS is on our phones. The NPC capability makes the (occasionally glitchy) readers obsolete.

Alternatives Considered

QuickBooks Desktop

Reasons for Choosing Square Point of Sale

Heartland is glitchy, too expensive, and the product doesn't have as many tools or the ease of use that Square has. We upgraded to Square for less that we were paying for Heartland.

Switched From

Heartland Payments+

Pros

It is quite handy and fast, but then it

Cons

I have a small business. I bought the square reader machine last year for around $50, in Feb 2023. After almost one year and a half, the machine does not charge and I have to keep it connected to electricity all the time. This will cost me more than its price, and if I buy it again, I will have to pay $65. It looks like I have to purchase it again, but not happy that the machine stops working properly in less than two years.

Pros

System is affordable and fairly straight forward to use. There are lots of features that work well together.

Cons

No pre-authorization of credit cards so you have to hold cards behind bar. This is a real problem on busy nights.

Pros

That it is an all-in-one solution. It covers your whole business (with some caveats) but if you have a retails store it's all that you need.
For restaurants they're missing some features, but working on them.

Cons

That you can clearly tell it's built for retail. If you're a restaurant user some things don't work out.
Also the online store, they need to put that thing on a diet.

Alternatives Considered

Clover

Reasons for Choosing Square Point of Sale

We needed more than what the competitor had to offer

Switched From

SumUp

Reasons for Switching to Square Point of Sale

To be honest, the devices are beautiful. Then the coverage of features is fantastic.

Pros

Square Point of Sale has been very easy to use, easy to integrate and wonderful for keeping track of day-to-day sales. Very low customer complaints, and no problems during in-person sales. Hand-held device is very convenient, easy to transport and take to different locations

Cons

Given the NYS laws, and how/what our orders are, we are not a fan of the $0.x cent charge per order- would be much easier to just have the flat percentage. Also given the nature of our business, would be helpful to have a straight charge, not different for "card present" or not.

Pros

What I like most about Square Point of Sale is its simplicity and ease of use. The setup is quick, the interface is intuitive, and it handles payments smoothly. It’s perfect for small businesses looking for a hassle-free solution.

Cons

What I liked least about Square Point of Sale is the occasional transaction fees that can add up and the limited customization options for receipts and reports.

Pros

It was easy to install on my phone and simple to learn.

Cons

I wish it was easier to purchase the hardware. Lots of places were sold out when I needed one.

Pros

It is easy to use. I like to use it at my vendor events

Cons

The fees charged . I wish that the fees were less

Pros

I like the ease of the application all together being able to sale products and buy product was made easier with square point of sale

Cons

Havent seemed to have found anything i dislike yet

Pros

Square was really easy to set up and use. It has a lot of great features like analytics, sales reports, manual credit card entry, and more. It's also really easy to set up and edit your menu. The fees that Square takes on credit card payments are not high and are very reasonable. Square is also excellent for on-the-go sales and is very portable. It's easy to take to different venues and events.

Cons

I encountered a lot of problems with Square. I was mainly using it to sell goods at my local farmer's market. Often after swiping a customer's credit card Square would be stuck with the loading symbol and the transaction would never go through. There were many times I had to shut down the app and reopen and ask the customer to swipe again with another credit card. There have been times where the customer was charged twice and times where the customer was never charged at all! It was very disappointing encountering these setbacks while I have a limited time to sell at the farmer's market. There were also times where it appeared that the sale went through and then later after checking my sales reports I could see that several transactions were missing and I was never paid. I also tried Square on multiple devices but the problems persisted.

Pros

The setup was quite easy, they don’t take up to 7days to process your money so thats a plus, the interface is straight forward. They support various card types for debiting

Cons

You can’t contact them via live support chatYou will be asked to verify your business once a large amount of money is processed through their payment gateway and if you don’t meet all their criteria the money will be held for 120days before release

Alternatives Considered

Square Payments

Reasons for Choosing Square Point of Sale

Stripe took too long to process my money to my bank account

Switched From

Stripe

Reasons for Switching to Square Point of Sale

The shorter time in processing payments

Pros

I like the easiness of processing transactions on this software! Takes away 90% of my businesses financial headaches.

Cons

I don’t have any cons in regards to Square Point Of Sale because any and everything I need the app to do, it does!

Pros

My favorite part of Square is the ease of it all. It was easy to set up, it is easy to use and it is easy to integrate. This makes life so much easier when you have locations all across the country.

Cons

We only use Square for payment processing. It is a little more expensive than some of the other solutions if that is all you are using.

Alternatives Considered

Stripe

Reasons for Choosing Square Point of Sale

Ease of use, better control and better reporting

Reasons for Switching to Square Point of Sale

We felt that Square was the most user friendly, most flexible and the reporting suited our needs better.

Pros

Our setup was Square POS for the brick & mortar piece of our store, then we had another software acting as our master of inventory between our store, and website, which was hosted on a different, more robust ecommerce platform than Square. I feel it's fair to say that Square kept its promise in terms of its uptime, and ease of use. We rarely had issue with Square POS being down, though it did happen for a few hours here and there, but again, well within their uptime promise.

Cons

What did I like least about Square POS? That would be the time Square, with zero notice, pulled the plug on our store and website as a credit card processor, leaving us without any modern way to process payments. Customer service IS part of the deal, right? Well, when I contacted Square about this, I was not given a reason, or the ability to appeal the decision. I was simply told to move on to a different solution, and no further information would be provided.

Alternatives Considered

Shopify POS and Toast POS

Reasons for Switching to Square Point of Sale

We went with Square POS because we are in the CBD business, and Square invited us to be part of their CBD payment processing program. There's that, and in all honesty, the software is incredibly easy to set up, and use. It's certainly not the most robust solution in terms of reporting, but to cover that we were able to connect to a solid IMS via API. For most businesses, I think Square would be a simple POS solution, but again, beware, there just wasn't a lot of communication from their end on major decisions that negatively impacted our small business.

Pros

Square is offering a software that is versatile and also nearly free for a new business that doesn’t have money to spend on start up costs or an existing business that has been ripped off from an expensive POS company. You can literally just use your iPhone with a card swipe. Or for the brick and mortars use their new and sleek looking square register.

In terms of interface, Squares basic dashboard is free to the public and can be set up as fast as signing up for a email account. You can learn it’s navigation in a matter of minutes and you are able to subscribe for the extras you need like loyalty, gift cards or marketing. Very simple, very user friendly, and the support is actually helpful.

Cons

Switching from a POS company that requires a lot of upfront infrastructure and training, I don’t have a lot of bad things to say about squares POS and software other than the existing equipment they told us we could use hasn’t necessarily been easy to re use. Also you are not able to get as granular in customizing some features as other softwares

Pros

The ability to set this software was super easy. It was easy to add your inventory and take your pictures all from the app, Also no monthly fee to use the service was the items that sold me on when 1st starting out.

Cons

The web presence is super lacking. No add ons, or 3rd party integrations is why I moved on to another service. The ability to really customize your website is not there, Every one has to a website that will attract sales and customers. This is just a POS 1st and website 2nd. I moved to a service that had website 1st and a POS 2nd. But I still love Square's POS software better.

Alternatives Considered

Venmo

Reasons for Choosing Square Point of Sale

No add ons, or 3rd party integrations is why I moved on to another service. The ability to really customize your website is not there, Every one has to a website that will attract sales and customers. This is just a POS 1st and website 2nd. I moved to a service that had website 1st and a POS 2nd. But I still love Square's POS software better.

Switched From

Shopify

Reasons for Switching to Square Point of Sale

Inventory system and website.

Pros

Square makes taking card and digital payments extremely easy and simple. It’s quick and convenient for both me and my clients. I also don’t have to purchase a POS unit as the small free card reader that plugs into my phone is all I need.

Cons

The fees for this processor are quite hefty. While square’s fees aren’t hidden by any means, and are average for payment processing fees, I really wish there was a simpler, flat-rate monthly fee option that could save me money without taking 2.6% + 6¢ out of each of my sales. Or at least, with what I’m paying in fees, I really should not have to pay extra for other features like email/text marketing through Square.

Pros

We integrated everything from POS, to reporting, to payroll into Square

Cons

The linking between online inventory to in store, real time inventory is awful.

Alternatives Considered

Toast POS

Reasons for Choosing Square Point of Sale

Paychex payroll was very bad. We wanted to integrate all of our payroll and timekeeping

Switched From

Paychex Flex

Pros

Square POS was very easy to set up. The first card reader you receive (a simple plug in to an iPad or iPhone) was free. We created an account online, attached a bank account, and created a menu of items/services we provide. Then we simply chose photos for each service or product category so that it looks nicer in the app for our employees. The result was a very simple set up and a very clean looking POS.
What's also nice is that Square POS is good at being able to refund patients if something was charged incorrectly. They also get receipts if they choose to via text message or email.
Changing the prices and adding or deleting items on the service/products you sell is quite easy. You simply log in to the website and make changes. Also, you can turn in options such as giving customers a choice to tip or not.
For being an office that used to take cash only, choosing Square POS was the way to go in entering the world of credit cards. We have no regrets and have no had problems. The correct amount of $$ we received (minus 2.75% of every transaction) gets deposited into our account every week. And we no longer have to hire a collections agency to go after those who don't have cash or mail in checks because they will simply pay through credit card now.

Cons

Square does take 2.75% of your transaction each time. You can find cheaper alternatives, but not with the ease of set up and use that comes with Square. The bigger con about Square POS is that if you have take a payment over the phone and manually type in their credit card information instead of typing it, they charge extra at 3.5% of the transaction.
Also, the first card reader they send you is a simple swiper, but we found that it didn't always work well. Most cards these days have chips, and if you want a good and safer reading you'll want to purchase the Chip reader at $49. We don't regret the purchase though.
Lastly, if you are a restaurant and choose to include the option to allow customers to tip, know that square takes 2.75% of your ENTIRE transaction (including the tip your customers add).

Pros

I loved that Square was so easy to start up and operate immediately. It literally takes minutes to set up and the hardware once it is sent to you is the simplest set up. I think the biggest appeal to Square is that it is fool proof and anyone can get this POS to work for them. The second biggest YES for this product is that it is super easy to take with you to offer card payment options to clients while you are outside of your brick and motor. I think offline payments and the option to take payments on their app through the mobile card swiper is a huge selling point to Square customers.

Cons

I feel the cost of the transaction to the business owner is quite high when compared to other companies. They have one of the highest if not the highest transaction costs. Some owners will charge this back to their customers via a fee (which is illegal in some states) and others could just cushion this cost of doing business into their service prices but it is worth mentioning that it is something not so great about Square. The other not awesome part of Square is the reports. They are very mundane and not very extensive. It is quite clear that Square is a POS system that offers payment transactions first and later on enable the appointments and the reports. I hope to see much improvement with those back-end functions in the near future. It is imperative to a business owner to know what the health of the company looks like at any given moment and transactions is not even close to the only report necessary.

Alternatives Considered

Clover

Reasons for Switching to Square Point of Sale

Ease of use and integration

Pros

i found the following features as most impactful:
- lightweight, quick payment processing and mobile
- best sales database management
- builds consumer confidence with its ease of use and real-time payment updates.
- affordable & reliable
- phone app allows payments at all locations.
Yes the product is quite easy to use for:
- payments
-invoicing with customers full details
-mobile payments
- pulling sales reports
- contactless payments
Yes i was successfully able to implement the integration of the app/software/SAAS with my existing business processes quite smoothly and easily as i could set it up with a little self-help, effort, and online training guides..

Cons

I found the following features that were either missing or could be improved:
- difficulty in card reading for payments and chip card reading
- could be made in other dark colors instead of WHITE
- features to make payments by consumers using heir online square account
- fees could be reduced further,
- better connectivity and tutorials to use needed

I found the following features or aspects of the product that are difficult to use:
- freelancers do not get more options
- complex to understand the POS platform
- manual entry of chargeable dollar amounts
- non-availability of phone support
- difficult to customize
No, the integration of the app/software/SAAS with my existing business processes not so much difficult as i could set it up with a little self-help, effort, and online training guides.

Pros

I was working as a barista in a new coffee location in my local town. The owner of the shop was pretty new to the industry, and didn't have a lot of business experience. She needed a way to run cards, and she was looking at a few different solutions, but I mentioned Square, and she ran to CVS and bought one right away. She wasn't very tech savvy, so I volunteered to get it set up. It probably took me less than an hour. The interface is a breeze to use, customers get it right away when they need to sign for charges or enter phone numbers. There were days that I was the only person on staff, using Square and running between the milk steamer and the register was a breeze. One feature we used often was using a cell phone to take orders while people waited in their cars. This allowed us to reduce the lines in our shop, and keep the morning rush moving.

The flat rate pricing makes things extremely easy as well. As someone that is not an accountant, this made my life a lot easier.

Cons

Some of the reporting features can be confusing to read, and more than once have resulted in us blindly refunding customers.

Sometimes the card readers gave us problems, but this was usually solved with a quick reset.

Pros

My first experience with Square Point of Sale was a couple years back as a Receptionist in a Fitness Facility. On a daily basis, we used Square Point of Sale whether it was to buy merchandise, memberships, snacks or sign up for special workshops. What I particularly loved most about Square Point of Sale was its easiness to use and software platform. We could receive payments from the company cellphone, iPad or computer depending what was available at the time. The platform was consistent on all three devices and just as easy to use on all of them as well.
In later years, as I opened my own Health and Wellness business, I went straight to Square Point of Sale as my main way of receiving payments. It has been an excellent tool and is always up to date. What I also like the most is how quick it is and easy to receive payments and it accepts most credit cards.

Cons

Square Point of Sale is excellent for receiving payments and I don't have any negative experience with the platform. The only thing I wish would be that the analytics and reports that I receive for all payments and invoices would be easier to read. I have a bit of trouble understanding them. Other than that, overall great platform.

Alternatives Considered

PayPal Commerce Platform

Pros

The grid view is simple and easy to understand for new hires, particularly the fact that you can add images and order the grid however you like (easy to organize products in a way that makes sense for the business) as well as "folder" items that aren't too complicated but allow you to have more items accessible on the screen. The open tab feature is helpful as we have situations where companies want to leave a ticket open for employees to order at their leisure, and that feature is helpful and easy to use once you understand it. Also nice that the screen for the user and the screen for the customer are separate so none of the annoying "turning the screen" stuff. Overall just a very intuitive and simplified system for POS, I've seen some that are a visual mess and Square makes it simple to work fast and efficiently.

Cons

The tab feature is great once you learn it, but I had trouble at first "saving" the ticket because the system doesn't make it obvious how to set the order as an open tab after you start entering it. There were times I thought I had the tab saved but realized I had closed out of it instead and didn't have the order or card info saved which was a pain. There were also a decent amount of crashes and outages. Cards from certain banks seemed to cause the system to crash, and eventually it would freeze up randomly mid-order and you'd have to unplug. Wasn't great on super busy days when you're trying to churn through customers.