Can Shopify withhold my funds without justification?

[Justin888]

I am absolutely shocked!

Shopify asked me to supply a "business registration document" to verify my account.   I did this immediately using link provided.   

Then I received an email saying my payments had been suspended due to bank issue.    This was 10 days after payments were suspended.  

I immediately contact support to enquire how a bank error occurred after several years of problem free payments.

I was told the business registration document must be provided.

I informed this had already been done. 

I was told the "matter would be escalated".

Three days later nothing is resolved.

My balance with shopify keeps accumulating.

They are now holding two weeks worth of my payments.

I cannot contact support as most of the time the link is hidden (I presume because it is outside of hours but there are no advertised hours)

Shopify is holding half of my turnover for this month, with no justification, explanation, and only communication 10 days after this occurred.

CAN THEY DO THIS?   THIS IS A MASSIVE RISK TO A BUSINESS.

I am shocked!!!!

[Trevor]

@Justin888 

I can understand how this would be a frustrating situation to be in, especially given that your payments have been on hold for more than two weeks which can be impactful to you and your business. As per our Terms of Service, we do hold the right to review and verify stores on an ongoing basis to ensure they adhere to our policies.

Based on the details you have provided, it sounds like the document provide may not have been what our teams were looking for. This can happen if the document is expired, the incorrect document is provided, or if the image is blurry, or not containing the full document. In any case, this can be resolved through an escalation which our Support teams have done on your behalf. 

Our Account teams aim to review escalations within 24-72 business hours; however, there may be a delay in hearing back as the turnaround time heavily relies on the number of tickets our team is handling. Nevertheless, you will be the first to hear back as soon as your ticket has been reviewed. 

[cherylfoh]

You may have a "right" to hold funds, but you don't have a right to do it indefinitely and continue to hold it just because people are emailing you about it. That is what your support team is doing to your customers right now.

You know it is wrong. They know it is wrong. Everyone who reads these message boards knows it is wrong, but you keep doing it and acting like we are out of line for complaining.

And the hold is not necessary to do a review. Just because you have the right to do something doesn't mean it is the right thing to do.

Change your policies.

[cherylfoh]

Peter,

Please re-read your policy. This is the exact qoute.

"We reserve the right to hold funds in your Shopify Payments Account while awaiting the information requested above. "

You are violating your own user agreement. It states you have a right to hold our funds WHILE AWAITING  THE INFORMATION REQUESTED.

But after we send you the information, which we did immediately, you are still holding the funds.

So you are not AWAITING  the information any longer, but our funds are still on hold.

Do you not see the problem here?

[Adam-A]

Yea shopify are terrible, they withhold money WITHOUT requesting any documentation.... so their policy is null and void. 

[Justin888]

Finally it is resolved.  Turns out there was nothing wrong with the document supplied.  It had been read incorrectly by Shopify staff.    People make mistakes, but this does not explain the 10 DAYS TAKEN TO NOTIFY ME OF THE SUSPENSION, and the further six days to resolve it (not up to 72 hours as promised), and BTW despite resolving it, I am still yet to receive my actual payout 20 days after supplying the correct verification document within the time frame requested.     As per my original message I am absolutely shocked.

[Daniellelicata]

This is happening to me now and they are holding over 75k in funds after requesting documents and us turning them around in hours. I have called Shopify 10 times and no one can provide any help or insight. I need urgent assistance from Shopify . This will absolutely affect my business as we won’t be able to pay bills and run payroll! I am sick over it and have spent endless hours just to hear we are in a que and need to await a response. I hope someone at ahopify reads this and gets back to me finally! 

[cherylfoh]

We are going through the same thing. Loyal customers from Day 1 and they are spitting in our faces.

[Hydro11]

After 5 years of being with Shopify, they decided to hold our funds due to products on our site.  We removed the products and emailed that we did so. Shopify emailed us on a Saturday and now it's wednesday and we have yet to hear back from them.  I have asked several time what we need to do to get our funds, but no response.  Customer Service says their hands are tied and can't forward me to the department that emailed me.  Running a small business is tough enough and especially hard without cash flow.  

[Adam-A]

Yep you should move away from Shopify payments and their banking team. Use a 3rd party provider. 48% of their revenue comes from the payments system and they don't deserve it. I think the money is held for other reasons like paying dividends to shareholders and then just refuse to acknowledge the customer.