Square Cash App: Send and receive money

The Cash App by Square is a convenient, straightforward way to send and receive money using just your smartphone. After taking the U.S. by storm, Cash App finally reached the UK in 2018. It’s a peer-to-peer platform, designed for sending cash between friends and family.

Unfortunately, it is not available for international payments yet, so you’ll need to find an alternative to help you send and receive money internationally. This is where Wise can help.

Using the Cash App to send money

1. Before you can start using Cash App, you’ll need to create an account. This process is nice and easy, as you’ll only need a phone number or email address¹, plus a few other details. You can also choose to be identified by a Cashtag if you prefer. This is like a username, made up of a unique combination of letters and numbers. The next step is to link a debit card and your bank account to the app.

2. To send money, all you need to do is choose a contact, or enter the recipient’s phone number or email address, and tap in the amount you want to send. You’ll also be prompted to enter what the payment is for – for example, birthday money or pizza night.

3. The app uses your linked card or bank details to make the payment, which should arrive in the recipient’s account instantly. Alternatively, you can deposit money from your bank account or debit card directly into your Cash App, and use this balance to make the payment.

Are there limits?

If you’re planning on giving Cash App a try, you should be aware that there are limits on the amount you can send. You may need to provide further ID information if you want to send over £250² (either in one transaction or in multiple payments over 7 days). The most you’re allowed to send in one go, or across multiple transactions in a short period, is £1,500. You also can’t send less than £1³.

Is Cash App international?

Cash App may be convenient and free to use, but unfortunately it does have its limitations. Crucially, it doesn’t permit international money transfers at the moment. This means you can send to people within the UK, but you can’t use Cash App for UK to US transfers. Similarly, users in the U.S. can only send within their home country. The ability to send and receive internationally may be introduced at some point, but for now, Cash App doesn’t offer global payments or currency conversions.

Square cash card: Is it available in the UK?

Square offers Cash App users in the U.S. an additional service – a linked Cash App debit card. This can be used to withdraw cash from an ATM and spend using your app balance. The Cash App debit card for UK customers isn’t currently an available option⁵.

Send and receive money in the UK & abroad with Wise

It’s fast and simple – you can even send money using just the recipient’s email address. And you can hold, spend and receive money in 40+ currencies, making it a truly international payment platform.

There’s only a small, transparent fee to pay, and you’ll get the real exchange rate on every transaction.

Receive payments with Cash app

Sending money with your Cash App account is easy, but how does it work when you’re the lucky recipient of a payment?

1. Well, the sender follows the same steps as above, but you’ll receive a pleasing notification in your account that a payment has arrived. You can even use the app to request money, which sends a friendly nudge to your friend or relative to send the money through the app.

2. You can then take a look at payment activity in the app, and choose to transfer funds to your bank account. Or if you have someone you’d like to pay using the app, you can instead leave the money in your Cash App balance and use it to make the payment.

Just like with sending money, Cash App is limited in terms of where you can receive cash from. You can only receive GBP from someone within the UK, so you would need to use another method to get birthday money from a relative in the States, for example.

And there’s also a limit on how much someone can send you in one transaction, or in several payments over a 7-day period. You may be asked for further ID to receive over £500⁴, while the most you can receive within a week is £10,000.

There are lots of ways you can quickly and easily send money, and Cash App is a solid option for simple, instant UK transfers. But if you want to send or receive internationally, you may find it a little limiting.

Consider an alternative for international payments, such as Wise – especially since there’s also a handy app for tracking transfers in real-time, wherever you are in the world.

Sources used:

Sources checked on 13-February 2020.