A charge starting with SQ * on your statement

SQ * (or GOSQ.COM) means the card payment was taken by a business that uses Square to accept cards. The words after SQ * are that business, not Square. Square says it cannot refund you on the seller’s behalf, so your money comes back from the seller or through your bank.¹

What it looks like on a real statement

Square’s examples are tidy: a bakery called Sweet Dozen shows as SQ* SWEET DOZEN BAKERY. A bakery with no business name on file shows as SQ* BAKERY JOHN SMITH, and a person selling baked goods as SQ* JOHN SMITH.¹ A Square account gave the same Sweet Dozen example to someone asking about a charge in September 2025.² The lines people have actually copied off their statements onto Square’s own forum are less tidy:

The seller’s name often gets cut off mid-word — "Flora Manageme", "SERVIC" — so search for the start of the word, not the whole thing.

The name may also not be the one on the shop. A volunteer who sells through Square explained in July 2026 that if a business is registered with Square under a parent company, your statement shows the parent company, not the trading name you know.⁸ Sellers cannot remove the SQ part: a Square account told one who asked that it is "an identifying stamp used by Square to classify that the transaction was made through Square."⁹

How to find out who charged you

1. Think about where you paid in person Square’s own list of questions for cardholders: did you take a taxi, visit an outdoor market, or eat at a food truck? Did someone take your card on a small reader attached to a phone, or ask you to sign with your finger? Did you order by phone, mail or online around that date?¹ One person on the forum traced their GOSQ.COM charge to a car service from a hotel to the airport.³
2. Check whether it is the same charge twice If you added a tip, Square says the sale can show twice: the amount before the tip is a pending authorization that "will drop off in a few days".¹ Wait for it to go before you dispute it.
3. Search your email and texts for a receipt Square’s article asks whether you got an electronic receipt by email or text, and points you to the seller’s contact details printed on it.¹ Search for the amount (for example 41.20) and for "Square".
4. Use Square’s receipt lookup Go to squareup.com/receipts. When we checked on 25 September 2026, both that address and gosq.com itself forwarded to the same lookup page at profile.squareup.com. A Square account described it to a cardholder in 2017: enter the exact amount on your statement, the date, and the last four digits and expiry date of your card.¹⁰ It does not always work. One cardholder reported in 2021 that it would not recognise their debit card.¹¹
5. If you find the seller, ask them for the refund If what you paid for never arrived, or was not as described, Square’s advice is to contact the seller directly.¹ Do it in writing and keep the reply. You may need it in the next step.
6. If you cannot identify it, or never agreed to it, go to your bank Square’s own help article says that if you cannot reach the seller, or you are certain the charge is unauthorized, you should contact the bank that issued your card.¹ A Square account told one cardholder that disputing with the bank is "the fastest, most effective way to resolve an issue like this".¹⁰ Bring the statement line exactly as printed, every date and amount, and what you already tried. Ask your bank what its deadline is for disputing a charge. It depends on the bank, the card network and the reason, and missing it can end your options.

Can Square refund me, or tell me who it was?

Refund: no. Square’s help article said "Square is unable to provide refunds on behalf of Square merchants."¹

Who it was: only so far. The same article said Square would "provide public information that may help you remember the charge".¹ In practice, one cardholder who went back and forth with support in 2017 and 2018 wrote that support "wont help you with identifying the seller. All you get is that they will contact the seller and have them contact you". A week later, by their account, the seller still had not been in touch.⁴ A Square account in the same thread told them that if they still did not recognise the charge after looking up the receipt, they should contact their card issuer and file a dispute.¹² Your bank has more power here than Square’s support queue does.

Is this fraud?

Usually, no. Most of the time it is a real purchase from a small business under a name you did not expect. But anyone can open a Square account and type a card number in by hand. Nobody has to be standing in front of a reader.

In September 2026 a user wrote on the forum that their father’s caregiver had opened a Square account and charged his card over two months, "totaling $2700+". The father has no Square account; by the user’s account, the card details were entered manually.¹³ That is their report, not our finding. If you see several SQ * charges you cannot place, and especially if they repeat, treat them as unauthorized: call your bank, ask for the card to be replaced, and dispute each charge.

A dispute may have to wait for the charge to finish. The person who posted the SQ *SQUARE PAID SERVIC line says their bank would not open a fraud dispute until the charge moved from pending to posted.⁷

If the line says Cash App instead

Cash App has its own support, separate from Square’s. In August 2024 a Square account on the forum sent Cash App questions to Cash App Support at cash.app/help, or by phone on 800-969-1940, Monday to Friday, 9am to 7pm Eastern.¹⁴

The page Square used to send you to is gone

Accounts answering for Square on its forum pointed cardholders to a help article called "Square Purchases and Cardholder Help", in 2016 and again in 2018.³¹² It is the source of the statement formats, the checklist and the refund position quoted above. When we checked on 25 September 2026, that address forwarded to the front page of Square’s Support Center. The article is not there. The last copy in the Internet Archive is dated 4 December 2024, and that is the copy cited here.¹

Why this page is on a site about held money

The same payments look different from the other side of the counter. If you are the seller, not the cardholder, the Square file collects what sellers report about Square holding their payouts, with what Square’s terms say about it. Every entry is in the incident record. If your statement shows PADDLE.NET instead, that one is a software subscription. If it starts SP without the Q, it is an online shop on Shopify. If it starts WPY*, it went through WePay, usually a donation, an event sign-up or club dues. If it starts TST*, it is a restaurant that uses Toast.

Sources

1. Square, "Square Purchases and Cardholder Help", Square Support Center (US), article 5103. Archived copy of 4 December 2024. The original address, squareup.com/help/us/en/article/5103-square-purchases-and-cardholder-help, forwarded to the Support Center front page when checked on 25 September 2026. Archived copy read in full on 25 September 2026.
2. Reply from the account Laurie_, 16 September 2025, on Sheik453, "Trying to Identify a Charge on My Unverified Square Account", Square Community. community.squareup.com. The account is labelled "Alumni" on the forum today. Verified 25 September 2026.
3. deb64, "Charge from gosq.com on my bank statement?", Square Community, 4 April 2016; the reply from the account Sean, 18 July 2016 (labelled "Alumni" today), which links the cardholder help article; and the reply from piteasee, 1 November 2017, in the same thread. community.squareup.com. Verified 25 September 2026.
4. frustrated2, posts of 31 December 2017 and 7 January 2018 in the thread at source 3. First post · second post. Verified 25 September 2026.
5. Rconnor, "Purchase authorized on 09/21 Sq *Flora Manageme Gosq.Com FL", Square Community, 22 November 2020. community.squareup.com. Verified 25 September 2026.
6. bski, post of 19 December 2024 in the thread at source 3. community.squareup.com. Verified 25 September 2026.
7. ray879, "Unauthorized Pending Charge - Do Not Have a Square Account", Square Community, 4 September 2026. community.squareup.com. Verified 25 September 2026.
8. Reply from rtfulk, a Square Champion (a volunteer seller, not Square staff), 28 July 2026, on excvator, "What does the customer see on their bank statement ?", Square Community. community.squareup.com. Verified 25 September 2026.
9. Reply from the account Joe, 20 February 2020, in "How can I change how the business name appears on customers bank statements?", Square Community. community.squareup.com. The account is labelled "Alumni" on the forum today. Verified 25 September 2026.
10. Reply from the account Russell, 13 June 2017, on keith1956, "I have a square charge on my credit card, however, I do not recognize the vendor name", Square Community; and Russell’s reply of 10 October 2017 in the same thread. community.squareup.com. The account is labelled "Alumni" on the forum today. Verified 25 September 2026. The forwarding of squareup.com/receipts and gosq.com was checked by us on the same day.
11. judykraft, post of 29 July 2021 in the thread at source 3. community.squareup.com. Verified 25 September 2026.
12. Reply from the account Helen, 1 January 2018, in the thread at source 3. community.squareup.com. The account is labelled "Alumni" on the forum today. Verified 25 September 2026.
13. EMMAW7, "Someone made a fake square account and charged my dad over the course of 2 months totaling $2700.", Square Community, 16 September 2026. community.squareup.com. Verified 25 September 2026. Not a record entry: it is a report by a family member, not by the cardholder.
14. Reply from the account Lou8, 19 August 2024, in the thread at source 3. community.squareup.com. The account is labelled "Alumni" on the forum today. Verified 25 September 2026.