Saying Goodbye to Square Loyalty (For Now) — Seeking Better Options for Service-Based Businesses

[Vanilla]

Hi Square Community 👋

After extensive testing, I’ve decided to step away from the Square Loyalty program for now. The current points-based system works well for retail, but it’s not well suited for service-based businesses.

For services, the points model becomes cumbersome:

• Requires frequent manual entry
• Points reset after redemption, which feels counterintuitive
• Deposits and partial payments don’t automatically earn points, making tracking inconsistent

The Core Issue

In service-based businesses, loyalty is built through visits and progression, not just spend. Clients don’t “start over” after redeeming a reward — they continue building results and trust over time.

Proposed Upgrade: Per-Visit Milestone Rewards (No Points)

Instead of points tied to dollars spent, rewards would be based on completed visits or services.

Why This Matters

• Eliminates confusing point math and resets
• Reflects natural client progression
• Reduces manual work with deposits and partial payments
• Creates clear, motivating milestones
• Makes loyalty easier for both clients and staff

I’ve fully transitioned my business to Square and love the ecosystem overall, but loyalty has been the most challenging piece for a service-based model.

I know Square offers integrations with third-party loyalty programs, so I’d love to hear from others:

👉 What loyalty programs are you using for service-based businesses, and which ones do you recommend?

Thanks for reading 💛

[JTPets]

I am using Ai to built on top of Square loyalty. Using the existing loyalty program to track customwrs and adding a buy 12 get the 12th free. Might be worth connecting as im building it to support multiple tenants and you might be a good test case. 

[Vanilla]

Tell me more about it please!

[JTPets]

Im 95% complete on a program add on for loyalty where you create an offer. Buy x get the next one free. It tracks using square loyalty because every user has a phone number in it.

You select the items that qualify, you can have many offers and a auto drop off for eligibility.

When yoh get your limit it creates a custom discount code for you on your account and ties it to you with a customer group. All you have to do is sign in before you pay and the item or service would discount automatically.

I am building this stuff in days and then spending weeks making sure its perfect.

I bought  domain for it https://sqtools.ca it does a bunch of other stuff like purchase order generation by vendor, expiration tracking, catalog completion audit, daily cycle counts, auto discounts by expiration date, delivery route optimization 

[SVLFever]

I had an extremely succesful Loyalty program in my old POS system, but embraced Square's Loyalty to do some things the old system didn't do.  Interestingly, the reporting is MUCH better in my OLD system, but my customers have embraced Square Loyalty, so I'm going to stick with it.   Full disclosure, I'm mainly F&B, but customers are now getting some Bowling rewards through the Square APIs, so that helps....and there is improvements to come.

We also have found a couple bugs in the Loyalty system but the engineering team has fixed both of them, so there is still some care here on behalf of Square....but....

I'm hoping that your thread as well as a past thread that @TheRealChipA originally wrote causes someone at Square to say "hey, we have an opportunity here for improvement"...despite it not being on the roadmap.   Maybe you can send this up a bit @isabelle ?

[Vanilla]

Yes, I actually really like the Square Loyalty program. It just isn’t well-optimized for service-based businesses, especially now with the new deposits feature, which isn’t compatible and creates a lot of manual work.

Clients can’t redeem rewards on appointments booked with a deposit, so I have to create custom coupons just to apply the reward at checkout, then leave a note on the client’s profile confirming it’s already been redeemed.

Before deposits were introduced, points would auto-apply, but I still had to manage things manually because redeeming a reward would reset points instead of tracking progress in a milestone-style way.

I really want to keep my business fully within Square, so I’m actively trying to figure out a solid workaround to make it function better for a service-based setup.

And honestly, typing this response actually gave me a feature request idea lol.

[alejandro-ref]

Couldn't agree more — I run a salon on Square and the points model never mapped to how service clients actually behave. Visits matter, not dollar totals, and the reset after redemption feels backwards for long-term clients.

Full disclosure: I'm a co-founder of ViralRef (viralref.com), built specifically for Square merchants. We took a different angle on this same problem — instead of loyalty points, we focus on referrals, which in service businesses is usually where real growth comes from anyway. Plugs into Square via OAuth, tracks client referrals automatically, rewards via Square gift cards or coupons. No points math, no resets, no manual entry on deposits or partial payments.

Not a drop-in loyalty replacement — but if the underlying goal is "reward and retain my best clients," referrals tend to outperform traditional loyalty in service businesses.

Happy to compare notes if you want to dig in. Also curious what others in the thread are using.