Square Updates Banking Offering to Bolster Business Cash Management

Square has debuted banking tools designed to help sellers gain instant access to their funds.

The expansion of the platform’s banking service lets business owners sign up for a Square payments account and a free Square Checking account through one application from Square’s website and point-of-sale app, according to a Wednesday (April 30) news release.

In addition, Square has updated its savings account to include new personalized savings recommendations, using cash flow data and industry insights, to make it easy for merchants to organize their funds into folders for important expenses like taxes and supplies.

“Cash flow management is the lifeblood of a small business — it can mean the difference between success and failure,” the company said in the release.

“However traditional banking services, designed to serve larger, more established businesses, introduce high levels of cost, risk, and complexity for the most cash flow-dependent businesses. Their processing delays, transaction fees, disconnected systems, and lack of simple management tools make it difficult for small businesses to maintain healthy cash flow, access capital when they need it, or make informed financial decisions in real-time.”

According to the release, Square now lets business owners set up payments and banking in minutes through a single application to gain more control over their cash flow and eliminate the normal waiting period associated with bank transfers.

The launch comes as small businesses are facing increasing pressure, as PYMNTS wrote earlier this week in a report on how small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) are dealing with tariffs.

Close to 20% of SMBs are pessimistic about their odds of surviving the next five years, according to the PYMNTS Intelligence report “Brewing Storm: Why 1 in 5 Smaller Businesses Without Financing Fear They May Not Survive Tariffs.”

“We need high-growth businesses to survive and thrive [in this uncertain economy],” Lucy Demery, senior vice president and head of Visa Commercial Solutions, Europe, told PYMNTS in February, adding that embedded options are showing themselves to be a “huge unlock for supply chain payments.”

In spite of these efforts, not every SMB can adapt. Many are walking away from international sourcing altogether, instead going with domestic suppliers — even at a greater cost.

“But this tactic of reshoring is not always feasible,” PYMNTS wrote. “Many SMBs — especially those dealing in specialized goods or components — simply don’t have domestic alternatives. For others, switching suppliers means lengthy disruptions, costly compliance audits and the risk of losing product certifications.”