Square's revamped credit card and bill pay now let small businesses pay vendors that don't accept cards, as part of Block's broader finance integration push.
Square rolled out an upgraded version of its Square Credit Card last week, part of a push to bring payments, cash management, credit and bill payment into one place. Andrea Raj, head of product for Square Money, told American Banker that small businesses face a mismatch of money out and money in. “We’re trying to smooth all of that out,” Raj said. The company is tracking how businesses earn all of their income, not just funds coming through a point of sale.
The card now lets merchants pay vendors that do not accept credit cards, routing the payment as a direct deposit or a mailed check. Square also added tracking of B2B payments to its existing checkout service, Raj said. The card offers unlimited 3% cash back on Square Bill Pay transactions and 1.5% on all other purchases, Square announced Tuesday.
The refresh comes at a time when payment rivals are bulking up. Stripe, which also serves small and midsize businesses, is in talks to buy artificial intelligence startup OpenRouter for $7 billion, Bloomberg reported Sunday, citing sources. Stripe is also part of a group negotiating a potential acquisition of PayPal, according to the Wall Street Journal. Block may be involved in that group as well, CNBC reported in July, citing unnamed sources. Stripe’s OpenRouter deal would bring AI capabilities to payment processing, as banks and payment firms invest in so-called agentic commerce, American Banker noted.
Square’s moves aim to deepen the financial relationship with its merchant base beyond payment processing. By embedding cash management and bill pay into the same interface, the company is betting that small businesses will centralize their financial operations on Square’s platform rather than using separate banks and payment tools.
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