thread Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers in Archived Discussions (Read Only)

Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

Ani_ — Mon, 15 Jul 2024 21:05:11 GMT

Hi Seller Community!

I'm excited to announce the Small Business Administration has developed a partnership with Square to distribute the Restaurants Revitalization Fund (RRF) relief to the food and drink industry. The Restaurants Revitalization Fund (RRF) is part of the U.S. Government’s American Rescue Plan Act of 2021. This plan includes a $28.6B fund for awards to eligible food and beverage business owners, administered by the Small Business Administration (SBA).

On Thursday, April 29th at 1:30-2:30 PM PST /4:30 PM-5:30 EST, we'll host a Live Q&A with the Small Business Administration (SBA) to answer any of your questions about the application process. Please make sure to ask any questions directly on this thread below. Keep in mind, the SBA will only be addressing questions related to the Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF), not PPP.

How does the application process work?

We expect to start enabling applications for the Restaurants Revitalization Fund (RRF) on Monday, May 3rd at 12:00 PM EST. The award application program is owned by the SBA, and they are finalizing the process. We know how important these funds are to you and your business, so we are working as quickly as possible to get the application ready!

Unlike the PPP program, the Restaurant Revitalization Fund are awards and are not loans. They are not serviced as loans, and have no forgiveness component. There are no intermediary banks involved. Awards are determined by and allocated by the Small Business Administration (SBA) and not Square.

If you qualify for a Restaurant Revitalization Fund grant, you’ll have the option to apply Monday, May 3rd on Square Dashboard or through the SBA’s secure website. To help support applicants throughout the process, the SBA will offer phone and district office support.

Call center hotline (844-279-8898): Applicants can call this number for multi-lingual application or program support.
SBA District Offices: Applicants can reach out to their local District Office for tailored regional SBA support.

For more information about eligibility or to start your application, please visit the SBA Portal. You can also find more information about the Restaurant Revitalization Fund on the Support Center. Let us know if you have any questions for the SBA below!

Note: The SBA has announced that they will officially stop accepting applications for the Restaurant Revitalization Fund (RRF) on Monday, May 24, at 8 p.m. ET.

Restaurant Revitalization Fund

RobBob — Tue, 20 Apr 2021 23:35:52 GMT

Looking at the SBA website, there is an option for the RRF or Restaurant Revitalization Fund that takes the Gross receipts from 2019 and subtracts Gross Receipts from 2020 plus any PPP funding for an additional grant. Is Square going to participate in this funding as well? The SBA site says you can apply for the fund via SBA-recognized Point of Sale Restaurant Partners. Any thoughts?

Restaurant Revitalization Fund Questions

ACAcatering — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 15:46:31 GMT

Recently, the SBA has announced the Restaurant Revitalization Fund that will be available (and is directed at small businesses) many businesses within the food retail business. A couple of questions for Square would be 1) Are you one of the SBA's POS Restaurant Partners? They do not currently provide a list of partners. 2) If so, will you be participating in this funding? 3) If so, how fast will the your application be available? This appears to be on a first come, first served basis after a few other groups are cleared.
If this is something square customers are interested in, you do NOT have to use a bank or Square to apply for this funding. This can be applied for directly through the SBA when it becomes available. I do hope to use Square if they participate, but will not hesitate to apply through the SBA if it's not a quick rollout.
Here's a link to the SBA's FAQ page regarding this funding.

Re: Restaurant Revitalization Fund

RGwinemaker — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 18:29:24 GMT

I too would like to know if Square is going to be offering this and be ready to open in up the coming days?

Re: Restaurant Revitalization Fund

OntheBeach — Wed, 21 Apr 2021 20:46:04 GMT

There has been talk of this there is certainly nothing announced as to who the Restaurant Partners are. There has been no word from Square that I can find. Has anyone hear of a date that they will begin to accept applications? It should be soon.

Re: Restaurant Revitalization Fund

ashc — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 14:42:45 GMT

Heya @RobBob, @capsicum, @RGwinemaker, and @OntheBeach!

I moved your posts to an announcement post for this that @Ani_ just posted. 🙌

Check out her post above for details and date for the Live Q&A for any questions you have! If you're not familiar with the Live Q&A's, you can post your question about this program in particular directly in this thread and it'll be answered in this thread on that day. Hope this helps!

Re: Restaurant Revitalization Fund Questions

Ani_ — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 18:11:30 GMT

Hi @ACAcatering! We've moved your question over to this recent post. If you have any additional questions for the SBA please reply below! They will be answering questions on Thursday, April 29th at 1:30-2:30 PM PST /4:30-5:30 PM EST.

Re: Restaurant Revitalization Fund

OntheBeach — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 15:36:12 GMT

Thanks. I'm ready to start the application now. If Square goes live on the 4/30, then I suppose the SBA applications will open on the same day. Let me know if you need anyone to beta test your portal.

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

SteveMahr5566 — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 17:10:18 GMT

We utilized ChowNow for our online ordering in 2019 and 2020. If we apply for RRF through Square, are we able to include our gross receipts from ChowNow as part of that application? The gross receipts from both Square and ChowNow are included on our 2019 and 2020 1065 forms.

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

ACAcatering — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 17:54:49 GMT

If you read through the SBA's FAQ page that I listed above, you will find exactly where you need to look on your 1065. If you're an LLC, I believe the lines you need to compare are 1c from your 1065's from each year. Check the site to double check that info.

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

LedgeBrewingCo — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 17:58:32 GMT

When will Square be accepting applications?

Also, being a brewery/tasting room, we need to demonstrate that 33% of our sales were onsite (in fact all of our sales are), will square have an established sales report that will help demonstrate this?

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

Homefieldbrew — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 18:12:49 GMT

Why should I apply through square and not the sba?

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

PPastry — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 18:23:16 GMT

I am wondering when applications will be open. Will square inform us or do we have to be checking the site throughout the days weeks? Also wondering what is best applying thru square or the SBA site? This can be very stressful since it is first come first serve. I am also offering to be used to test beta test the portal if needed.

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

louisgerbier — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 18:24:27 GMT

Hi there,

Thanks for making this possible.
We have several Square locations that fall under a single LLC/FEIN (a seasonal location attached to a permanent restaurant has its own Square location for example). Will we be able to combine the sales of both of those locations in Square to report the gross receipts of that single LLC?

Thank you

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

Hottamalecater — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 18:30:27 GMT

Would I be able still to apply through Square even though I use mainly Paypal for transactions on pre orders? I had only used square for onsite events and it was right when covid hit. My onsite food truck business slowed down. It was the catering side that helped me keep going. Would I be able to upload 1099k?

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

bencrandall — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 19:33:47 GMT

Most of these programs have required that businesses provide 2019 tax return doc's and/or show a loss in revenue from 2019 to 2020. If a business began operation after March 2020, are they able to access the funds in this program? We have no doubt been effected negatively by the pandemic but cannot use 2019 financial documents to illustrate this because we were not in existence until last April.

Thanks!

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

OdaChicago — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 19:42:57 GMT

Do we have to have 2020 taxes filed in order to apply for this grant?

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

kimapollo — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 20:06:32 GMT

We started using square in November 2020 so we could do online ordering. Our old POS was a pos and not on the list of vendors. Should I submit through the SBA?

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

bazaru — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 20:13:37 GMT

Hello, my all of my applications are ready. If Square will be offering in the upcoming days, I would love to participate in the beta test. Thank you for your time.

Re: Live Q&A: Restaurant Revitalization Fund for Square Food and Beverage Sellers

jk84mc — Thu, 22 Apr 2021 20:50:59 GMT

I too would like to be part of the beta testing for this SBA Award revitalization funding. I took over ownership of an existing cafe back in Nov. 2019. I closed from March 23rd thru June 8th,2020. I have received both PPP's thru Square; but I only had 2 employees so it wasn't all that much. I have barely climbed over the halfway point of where was pre-covid. Fighting to keep "feet on the floor" behind the counter at the moment; while trying to look for new staff for the last 3 months. 50+ applicants, 40+ of them scheduled an interview with me, 7 have showed up, I hired 6 of them, I have ONE LEFT. They come in acting excited to have a job, work a day or two and I never see them again . It's maddening!!!