A reserve is a portion of your QashierPay funds that Qashier holds back for a set period so that customer refunds and chargebacks can always be covered. This article explains why a reserve may be placed on your account, how it is sized and released, and where to see it in QashierHQ.

A reserve is a temporary hold on part of your funds for a set period. Its purpose is to make sure that when a customer is refunded or raises a chargeback, the money is available straight away. Refunds and chargebacks are taken from your reserved balance first.

A reserve does not stop you from accepting payments. You can keep trading as normal, and the rest of your funds are paid out on your usual schedule.

Before we place a reserve, we email you the terms: the percentage of funds that will be held and how long the reserve will apply. A reserve typically runs for 60 to 120 days, which gives time for refunds and chargebacks to come through. Reserves are standard practice among payment processors. Funds held in reserve are released once the reserve period ends, minus any refunds or disputes the reserve was used to cover.

As a licensed payment institution (in Singapore, Qashier holds a Major Payment Institution licence from the Monetary Authority of Singapore), Qashier is responsible for the refunds and chargebacks that arise when a business takes payment but cannot deliver. When a dispute happens, the payment amount, plus any dispute fee charged by the card network, is deducted from your account balance.

If your balance is not enough to cover a disputed amount, both you and your customer are exposed. A reserve covers expected future disputes. If none occur, the reserve is released in full.

The size of a reserve depends on the level of risk we see on your account. We monitor every account continuously and look at factors such as your industry, payment activity, dispute rate, refund rate and financial stability.

A reserve may be placed when these factors point to a higher chance of refunds or disputes, or a risk that orders cannot be fulfilled. Common reasons include:

The Reserved funds: line only appears while a reserve is active on the account. The Account Balance menu item itself appears only when your business has a Qashier payout account. Your payouts are made from the Available Balance; the reserved amount is held back from it. See [SG/MY] How to Check Your Account Balance and Payouts in QashierHQ.

Qashier mainly uses rolling reserves: a set percentage of each new transaction is held in reserve and released after the reserve period, so the held amount rolls forward as you keep trading. Your reserve email states the exact percentage, the period and how releases are scheduled.

The example below is an illustration only. It uses a Singapore business with a 25% reserve, a release at the start of the fourth month after the month of sale, and the standard next-working-day payout. To keep it simple, it ignores your other sales and the minimum payout amount (in practice, a payout is made only once your balance is above the minimum; see [SG] When Will I Receive My Payouts? Settlement & Payout Schedule). The 3% rate is illustrative; your actual rates are shown in your Payout Report.

Shortly before a reserve is due to end, we review the account again to decide whether the reserve should be removed, reduced or increased. The decision depends on the financial health of the business, the number of refunds and disputes on the account, and other factors that affect its risk profile.

Reserved funds exist only to cover refunds and disputes. If a transaction is refunded or disputed, the reserve is used to cover it. Whatever is not needed is released in full at the end of the reserve period.

Questions about your reserve terms? Contact Qashier support.

Last verified: 25 Sep 2026 · Markets: SG, MY