I am leaving this message here because they removed it from r/stripe. If you are currently using Stripe or plan on using Stripe, I strongly encourage you to consider an alternate option as they will shut down your account for no legitimate reason and hold your funds indefinitely.

I currently have over $25k in Stripe and they have closed my account, paused payouts, and they have literally gone as far as telling me they are keeping the money. I even had a payout due on August 20th for $9.5k, which was the day they closed my account. They paid it out into my business account, and then withdrew it back out of my account after it was paid! 

Here is exactly what happened..

I run a lead generation company that does SEO, paid ads, etc for home service businesses. We have been with Stripe for over 2 years now. We just started incorporating conversational ai into our package so we can use “speed-to-lead” booking bots and reactivation campaigns. The AI stuff has been going great - so much that it’s become my main focus over the past 6 months. 

Just last month, a buddy of mine who runs a course/program that teaches students how to do SEO for home service businesses approached me about the idea of creating a separate course regarding conversational AI and teaching students how to set that up. We decide to go 50:50 on the course - he will endorse the course to his students and I will teach it. We create a separate Stripe account so that each of us can have full access to it and have visibility on the course sales. 

After just 3 days of launching the course, Stripe shuts down our account because they said, “After conducting a routine review of your business, we’ve found that it presents a higher level or risk than we can currently support”.I have provided them ALL of the information. All my LLC information, the websites, everything. Every student that joined signed an agreement. Not a single chargeback. 

Stripe won’t give me the time of day. Nothing but automated emails. I ask to speak with someone on the phone. They refuse. Here is the automated email.

They say, “Based on the information available to us, including documents submitted via your dashboard appeal your decision, we’ve determined that your account still presents an unacceptable level of risk. As a result, any funds in your account balance, and any pending charges, will be reversed within 5 days of the account closure data. If a balance still remains in your account after all reversales have been processed, it will not be made available to you, in accordance with Section 5.6 of Service Terms for Stripe Payment..”

WTF?! The balance will not be made available to me? Here is the thing, they only refunded 2 of the students. There is still $5k sitting in that account that they are just keeping! Stripe won’t even acknowledge me. They just send automated emails, refuse to pay me out, and keep the account shut down while they keep the money. 

Here is the part where it gets worse, and where I feel extra stupid. We had just launched the course and promoted it. So we had a calendar full of booked appointments with students who were interested in the course but no way to accept the payments. I had the bright idea of “Why don’t we just use my primary Stripe account until we get this whole thing sorted out”. So we started accepting payments in my primary Stripe account - the one that I use for my main lead gen customers.  After just a few days, Stripe shut that down too. And now they are holding over $20k in that account because it’s “high-risk”. Let me remind you that I did not have a single chargeback. 

There is absolutely NO WAY FORWARD WITH THEM. I have explained everything to them. Provided every document. All I get is automated responses that say, “Thank you for bringing your concerns to our attention. Stripe determined that your account was too high risk to support. As such, it closed your account.”

They will NOT talk to you. They will not work with you at all. As far as I can tell, they are keen on keeping my funds in there forever unless I take legal action.