Understanind declines in my transaction reports ?

[rdeeble]

I am  new to understanding Square reports and  noticed today that I have an alarming amount of "declines" listed in my transaction reports. This does not make sense to me because I am not getting any kind of decline message when I take payment via the viteral terminal.  I have repeat customers each week so I need to know if someones card isnt work correctly

Does a decline on my transaction reports  mean that I may not of been paid on those transactions?  IF so how can I verify? Wouldn't Square warn me at the time of sale if the card was declined? Or at least shortly thereafter?

Could someone please walk me through this part of square and how I can verify these sales have been completed successfully?

[londontea]

Hi @rdeeble ! The transaction report can be pretty alarming, but it's usually not bad news. 

Seeing a decline in the transaction report doesn't necessarily mean that the payment was unsuccessful. You can confirm that transactions were successful by going to the Transactions section of the Dashboard. If it's listed there then that means the payment was successful. 

Square always notifies me when a card is declined, so I'm guessing there's another reason for these decline notices. Do you only take payments on the virtual terminal, or do you also take payments through a website, invoices, and/or in-person? Does the transaction report show the source of these declines as "Virtual Terminal"?