Square Card Reader MS?

[thebusymind]

Well, wait... Not that I'm condoning this - there's plenty of other ways to meet your minimum spend w/o a Square reader - but how could the credit card company know that this was happening? Doest this just come through as a standard transaction?

[john398]

my work cafeteria uses square, of course the trasanctions are jjust around $5 but usually 2 times a day, guess I probably have nothing to worry about

[Jlu]

I put $500 through my own Square account to help me meet the $2000/3mon spend for my AMEX PRG. Cost me less than $15 in merchant charge. The $500 minus ~$13 was in my checking account the next day. I waited a week and used that money to pay my AMEX bill.

My 25,000 MR points were deposited without issue last month,

If you plan to do this just keep the amount < $1000 as to not draw attention.

I plan to do this with my Citi TY Premier too.

[MrCollector]

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@Jlu wrote:

I put $500 through my own Square account to help me meet the $2000/3mon spend for my AMEX PRG. Cost me less than $15 in merchant charge. The $500 minus ~$13 was in my checking account the next day. I waited a week and used that money to pay my AMEX bill.

My 25,000 MR points were deposited without issue last month,

If you plan to do this just keep the amount < $1000 as to not draw attention.

I plan to do this with my Citi TY Premier too.

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Surprised amex didn't throw a fit about that. They're usually against Square from my experience. Maybe the low amount kept them at bay.

[sexy_kitten7]

People! MS stands for manufactured spending! Clearly, not everyone is on the same page. Please google if you don't know what that means.

OP, I've heard that it's very easy to get shut down for Paypal and Square MS, so it's not recommended!

I'd stick to AP and GCs

[Anonymous]

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@Jlu wrote:

I put $500 through my own Square account to help me meet the $2000/3mon spend for my AMEX PRG. Cost me less than $15 in merchant charge. The $500 minus ~$13 was in my checking account the next day. I waited a week and used that money to pay my AMEX bill.

My 25,000 MR points were deposited without issue last month,

If you plan to do this just keep the amount < $1000 as to not draw attention.

I plan to do this with my Citi TY Premier too.

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But from an MS viewpoint, that's a big premium for convenience.   Providing you don't live in a dead zone, you could buy a $500 Visa for $4.95, and cash it for $1 or less, for a total of $5.95.   You paid a lot more with a bigger risk.

[trumpet-205]

If you are going to use Sqaure for MS don't use your own Square account. You'll need a trustworthy friend, and don't do it so often.

[Sooners2013]

When square first came out they were soley a secondary processor and one that was suspicious by many card issuers. But now square has really come into it's own and acts like a real processor.  so simply having a charge on a merchant using square is nit alarm for your card issuer. No, yiu are not suppose to use a merchant account of your own. But I have charged almost 20,000 for a new roof with a mechany that used square. No problems ever.  So I don't think solely because a charge is processed by square does it cause alarm. 

[enharu]

I've shopped and dined at several places that uses square and never ran into any issues.

However, square is a bad idea for MS. It's much easier to just buy gift cards or other reloadable cards. Even loading money into a brokerage account and then withdrawing it after 90 days is a better option than square, though your brokerage will most likely shut you down if that's the only thing you're doing.

Square and paypal has a higher chance of freezing your accounts and withholding the money indefinitely. 

Also, if you are doing MS using your friend's business account, you or your friend will have to pay the 2.5-3% merchant fee, which is more expensive than buying GCs. Your friend is also supposed to report that amount as his income, and therefore may have pay taxes on it. In the end, you (or your friend) may end up paying a lot more than whatever the sign-up bonuses are worth. 

[MrCollector]

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@enharu wrote:

I've shopped and dined at several places that uses square and never ran into any issues.

However, square is a bad idea for MS. It's much easier to just buy gift cards or other reloadable cards. Even loading money into a brokerage account and then withdrawing it after 90 days is a better option than square, though your brokerage will most likely shut you down if that's the only thing you're doing.

Square and paypal has a higher chance of freezing your accounts and withholding the money indefinitely. 

Also, if you are doing MS using your friend's business account, you or your friend will have to pay the 2.5-3% merchant fee, which is more expensive than buying GCs. Your friend is also supposed to report that amount as his income, and therefore may have pay taxes on it. In the end, you (or your friend) may end up paying a lot more than whatever the sign-up bonuses are worth. 

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I was under the impression that gift cards wouldn't count toward min spend. Is that not the case?