How it works

Who is holding your money right now

Sam Bakker · Founder, GoCushy · 19 August 2026

When someone buys from you online, there is a period between their card being charged and the money arriving in your bank. The question worth asking about any platform is whose balance it sits in during that time.

Two arrangements that look identical from the front

In the first, the platform is the merchant of record. Your buyer’s money goes to them, they hold it, and they pay you on a schedule — weekly, fortnightly, after a rolling reserve. On the checkout page you cannot tell.

In the second, the platform never touches it. The charge happens on your own processor account, the money is yours from the moment it settles, and the platform is only instructing the transaction.

Both take cards. Both send receipts. The difference is invisible right up until it is the only thing that matters.

When it matters

A dispute about your account. If a platform holds your money and disagrees with you, the money is a lever. If it never holds it, there is nothing to withhold.
A change of terms. Payout schedules and reserves can change. A balance you do not control is subject to whatever the terms say next.
The platform failing. Rare, and not hypothetical. Funds held by an intermediary are part of that intermediary’s problem.
Your own cashflow. A seven-day hold on every sale is a week of your revenue permanently in transit.

How to check

You do not need to read the terms. Make one real sale and look at where it lands.

Does the charge appear in your Stripe or PayPal dashboard, with your business name on it?
Does the descriptor on the buyer’s statement say your business, or the platform’s?
Is there a payout schedule between the sale and your bank that the platform controls?

If the answer to the third is yes, the platform is holding your money. That may be an entirely acceptable trade — some of them do useful things with that position, including handling tax as merchant of record. It should just be a decision rather than a discovery.

Where GoCushy sits

Charges happen on your own Stripe, PayPal or Airwallex account. We are never the merchant of record, there is no payout schedule on our side, and no balance of yours exists here to hold.

The honest consequence: processor fees and disputes are yours to deal with, because the relationship is yours. We think that is the right trade for most people selling their own products. It is not the right trade for everyone, and a platform that acts as merchant of record and handles your international tax obligations is a legitimate thing to want.

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