Electronic Merchant Systems — Local services in Cleveland

I am a new, tiny retail business - 40-50k in revenue, mostly cash based, and out of my home currently. I needed the ability to accept credit cards and chose EMS+ because of the low fees. But you get what you pay for.

I use ONLY the app on my iPhone, and have needed to call support twice since becoming a customer, about four or five months. The app is unintelligent and clunky and does not even remotely come close to meeting my needs as a lightweight and simple POS for my phone. I have used it ten times in four months, and have never done anything but quick sale because it is so hard to use and requires so many clicks to get anything done. Perhaps it integrates with some larger piece of software that I am both unaware of and not using? I have logged on to the website a few times but found it also to have nothing I needed to access, as my one or two transactions a week don’t generate interesting reports, so I have largely ignored it.

Every customer who tried to use a Discover card was denied because the reader / my business was flagged as fraud.

By now you can probably tell I’m not going to stick with EMS - I have already ordered my Square because .50 for every $100 isn’t worth bad software design and fraud alerts, and I get a lighting reader instead of a headphone one. I tested the software and there is a reason everyone chooses it. But the final straw that made me switch was when I tried to log in to my account on a second device - the day I had successfully taken a credit card payment on a first device - and it told me my account was locked for inactivity. You can’t be inactive if you’re using your account. I then found out that if you don’t change your password every 90 days you get your account locked. Except for: you don’t get prompted to do this on the app. And you can continue to use the app... so how is it locked? I called to have it unlocked and asked how this made sense, basically that they needed to add this feature in to the app because otherwise I’m just going to call them every 90 days for unlocks (and I can’t be the only one) and the woman on the phone was super rude with me and eventually said she would submit a feature request but really didn’t understand why it would need that feature and insisted that I needed to use the website. Why and when would I need to use it? It doesn’t accept credit card swipes... and I get mailed a paper statement monthly of what I’ve collected and been charged. So the website is redundant. This is the second time I needed to call support and both times I felt that their support needed training on how to be friendly and pleasant. I can’t stand rude support having been in support for 20 years and I was willing to give them a pass once but twice means their corporate culture doesn’t care how the end user is treated.

They get 1 star from me for automatically closing batches every evening and actually working - though I can tell you I had no idea what I was doing the first time I used the app because, unlike Square, there was no tutorial. And unlike Square, there needed to be one. I will be happy to delete this off of my device and close my account, though I suppose I can just wait 90 more days and it will just lock itself...

Update: This company was reported to Ohio Attorney General FTC BBB and I will continue because I am not similar to any other person and I respect to receive respect back.

Stay away from EMS. There are so many better options available. I must say that my experience from the beginning with EMS Merchant has been the worst in the years that I have been in ecommerce. EMS Merchant is a company with little professional ethics, they are not transparent in their activities, the associates, all of them, without excluding any, work in a deceitful and non-transparent manner. Initially, when I completed my START application, they started sending me emails letting us know that our application had been approved, but they never mentioned that it was a temporary approval. After that approval, EMS Merchant begins to make its so-called Underwriten process (a process that you will never receive any notice of). EMS Merchant starts collecting payments and that's where the odyssey with this company begins. They ask for documents from previous merchants, then they ask for access to our system because they don't accept documents, they ask for screenshots and then tell you no, they don't accept screenshots and finally, they ask you twice to gain time and to continue entering payments. After waiting almost 1 month I decide to call to find out when the funds I have in the account are going to be released and Brittnay Brooks (a person who appears to have absolute charisma, but in reality it is only appearance) has hung up the phone just when I call to know when the funds are going to be released and also leaves the phone off the hook to not receive any more calls. After calling 5 times, someone I don't know who is, answers me and only to tell me that my account after more than a month of applying had not been approved and that my funds will be frozen for 4 months. I stopped receiving payments with them around 1 week ago, otherwise the amount of frozen money would be higher. Communicating with someone in this company who treats you properly is an odyssey. Their activities are deceptive, not at all transparent, they manipulate information and keep you in a state of total disinformation. In my life working in ecommerce I have experienced such an unpleasant situation. This company is plagued with a lack of professionalism and ethics. My recommendation, stay away, they are not an...

I’ve been with EMS Merchant Services since 2020 and have never had an issue accessing funds from my reserve, until now. Normally, I email my request and receive funds within 24–48 hours. My most recent experience has been the worst in my five years with the company. On Friday, Aug. 8, 2025, at 11:13 a.m. CST, I received an email from a rep named Alizabeth stating that a $1,100 client transaction had been randomly flagged and pulled for verification. Within 16 minutes (11:29 a.m.), I sent her everything she requested and asked why this was happening after years without issues.

Later that day, at 3:30 p.m., I called and learned she hadn’t contacted my client or their bank and said the office was closing. Meanwhile, not only was the $1,100 on hold, but all my transactions and a reserve request from earlier in the week were frozen. She said she’d call my client Monday.

Monday morning, I sent a 6 a.m. reminder. No updates, no calls. I eventually reached Patrick, her manager, who was rude, dismissive, and gave false claims that I hadn’t sent the requested info until “after hours” or “today” completely untrue, as Alizabeth had it within 30 minutes Friday. He claimed she was “working on my account” yet hours later, nothing was done.

At the end of the day Monday, Alizabeth emailed saying she still needed to contact the bank and client and would do it Tuesday. When I said I wanted to close my account after this was resolved, she replied that if I was closing the account, she “didn’t need to verify the cardholder.” This made it clear they had no urgency to release my funds.

This experience has been unprofessional, negligent, and damaging to my business’s credibility with my client. I feel like I’ve been held hostage from my own money. EMS once provided good service, but after this, I cannot recommend them to any business owner who values timely access to funds, communication, and...