365-day reserve on my store — 0% dispute rate — legal products — no precedent found anywhere online

Shopify Discussion
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AI-generated summary

Store owner reports Shopify Payments placed a 365-day reserve on payouts despite:

  • 0% dispute rate and zero chargebacks
  • legal products only
  • fulfilled/delivered orders
  • low total volume (~€2,000)

The key concern is that 365 days appears far longer than the commonly cited ~120-day reserve period. The seller says they could not find comparable cases online, notes the same store previously had a reserve lifted after 120 days, and requests a human review plus early release of funds. A support ticket reference is provided.

Responses indicate the forum cannot resolve account, legal, or financial issues directly. One reply advises contacting Shopify Support through official channels and, if the amount is significant, seeking legal advice rather than relying on public discussion.

Another reply explains that a 365-day hold is likely not a standard rolling reserve tied to card-network dispute windows, but a risk/compliance classification. Possible causes mentioned include business-model misclassification, prior account history, perceived long-term liability, or internal risk scoring. Recommended next step: request manual review by the payments risk/compliance team. The issue remains unresolved.

1

Hi Shopify Community,

I’m reaching out because I’m facing a situation that appears to be completely unprecedented.

My store Wicki Wicke has been hit with a 365-day reserve by Shopify Payments.

My situation :

  • Products sold : 100% legal

  • Dispute rate : 0% since day one

  • Chargebacks : zero

  • All orders fulfilled and delivered correctly

  • Total volume : ~€2,000

Why this is abnormal :

I have done extensive research and cannot find a single similar case online. My Reddit post about this situation is literally the first Google result when searching for “Shopify 365-day reserve.” Even a Shopify Expert on Reddit confirmed : “This is the first time I’ve ever seen a 365-day block.”

To put this in perspective : Shopify’s standard maximum reserve period is 120 days — even for high-risk or flagged products. My store is being held 3x longer than the industry maximum, with zero justification based on actual risk.

This also happened to me previously with the same store — and I successfully got it reinstated after 120 days.

My request : I am formally requesting an immediate human review of my account and an early release of the reserve given the complete absence of any dispute or risk indicator.

Ticket reference : 5a397543-5f97-4408-8097-d2123ba7db12

Has anyone in the community experienced anything similar or can a Shopify Staff member escalate this case ?

Thank you.

2

Hi @Louanne_Fazekas Contact support DIRECTLY: https://help.shopify.com/

Location location location:
these are the peer to peer forums.
This and account and legal/finance issue.
NO ONE here can fix an issue like this, shopify-staff are not here.

If it’s a big amount of money get lawyer.
This isn’t a back and forth discussion, just do it.
Do not even spend time responding to this unless you get info from shopify itself and want to publicly document your process.
Otherwise you’ll only encourage bots to tell you what you want to hear or try and get access to your account.

3

Hi,

That’s definitely an unusual situation, and I understand why it doesn’t make sense from your perspective — especially with a clean history (0% disputes, fulfilled orders, low volume).

One important point to clarify is that while many merchants reference ~120 days as a “typical” reserve window, that usually applies to standard rolling reserves tied to card network dispute timelines (for example Visa and Mastercard dispute windows).

However, a 365-day reserve is not usually a standard reserve — it’s typically associated with a risk or compliance classification at the account level, rather than transaction-level risk.

In cases like this, the trigger is often not based on:

• current dispute rate
• current volume
• or recent orders

but rather on factors such as:

• business model classification (sometimes misclassified)
• prior account history (even if resolved)
• perceived long-term liability exposure
• or internal risk scoring that doesn’t always align with visible metrics

The fact that this happened previously on the same store is particularly relevant, because prior flags can sometimes persist in internal risk profiles even after reinstatement.

At this stage, the most effective approach is usually to request a manual review specifically from the payments risk/compliance team, not just general support.

A few things that may help:

• explicitly ask whether the reserve is tied to a risk classification vs a standard reserve
• request clarification on what factor is justifying a 365-day liability window
• reference your prior reinstatement to show the account has already been reviewed once
• keep everything tied to the same ticket so the full history is visible internally

If this is a classification issue rather than a performance issue, it’s sometimes correctable — but it typically requires the right internal team to review it.

Hopefully you’re able to get a clearer explanation from the payments team, because based on what you described, it does sound like something that deserves a closer look.