GoCardless Reviews 2,423

We have had an extremely disappointing experience with GoCardless.

Our institution has been operating fully in compliance with all banking and regulatory requirements for many years, using multiple payment partners without issue. Despite this, GoCardless has shown a repeated lack of professionalism and reliability.

After freezing our account once last year without any valid justification, they have now abruptly closed it again — this time with no prior notice and no explanation, simply stating that the decision was final. The account was shut down on the same day as their email, leaving us unable to process payments or communicate with their team.

Their “Account Verification Team” provides no reasoning, no appeal process, and no access to support beyond automated responses. This is entirely unacceptable for a company handling financial transactions for legitimate educational institutions.

Such behaviour raises serious questions about their internal review process and how they treat compliant business clients. We had trusted GoCardless to handle payments securely and transparently, but this experience has shown the opposite.

We strongly advise other organisations to exercise caution before relying on GoCardless for payment processing. Their lack of accountability and abrupt actions can cause significant operational disruption.

My query about international payments for charities was referred to others to get a more definitive answer that was progress from the basic answer. Charities cannot use international payments but if you are a Company limited by guarantee and a charity you can use them. I now know better how to progress.

This is the most unprofessional organization in the UK. They took my customer money and never remit it back, asking them to go and contact their bank and try to get the payment back.
Shutdown my account for no reason and no explanation, after collection money from my customer!

Very easy to use for both us and our clients.

The service has been very good and reliable, there has been no problems with cashflow or payouts as long as I have been using it. They are quick to respond to support queries and very thorough in their responses.

They are constantly tweaking the dashboard which can be a little annoying at times but it is generally making the service a better product. Sometimes the newer dashboard features show incorrect numbers but that seems to be the only thing i can fault. If you manually check your transactions the figures are always correct. I occasionally spot check my transactions to be sure they are handling my funds in a trustworthy manner.

Since their fees are percentage based they can't really be expected to raise there prices, since there income will rise with my price rises. Aslong as the pricing stays where it is i think the cost is worth the convenience.

Really helpful and always gives you opportunities

Superb service, makes collecting payments very easy, good integration with Quickbooks, this has quite literally changed our business life for the better

second to none, perfect for our charity

GoCardless wasted weeks of my time. They demanded excessive documents, cited UK and Canadian laws instead of U.S. rules, then forced me to get an attorney letter just to approve my account. Two weeks later they shut me down without explanation, hiding behind “security reasons.”

No real compliance team behaves this way. Stripe, PayPal, Wells Fargo, and Capital One onboarded my business with no issue. GoCardless stands out as unreliable, unprofessional, and opaque.

I am filing complaints with U.S. regulators. Other businesses should steer clear.

Perfect for collecting customer payments

GoCardless shut down my account on 17 August without any prior warning, explanation, or chance to resolve whatever “concerns” they had. Only after the fact did they inform me that the account was closed – behaviour no FCA-regulated financial institution should get away with.

To make matters worse, they refused to provide my payout and transaction history, instead telling me to waste time with a 30-day Subject Access Request. These are MY records – showing fees, VAT deductions, and payouts – which I need for HMRC filings. Their stance actively obstructs my legal obligations.

The situation became even worse: after sending me a closure email, GoCardless still went ahead and collected payments from my customers who were set up on recurring direct debits. This was done three days after closure, when I no longer had any login access. They then took nearly two weeks to refund the money, without any notice or explanation. How can a provider claim my account failed verification, yet still process payments behind the scenes?

On top of that, they have not cancelled any of the mandates my customers had in place. I now have to contact each and every client individually to request that they manually cancel their mandates. The inconvenience and reputational damage this has caused my business is appalling.

Their customer “support” hides behind scripted lines about “policy” and “security” while completely ignoring statutory rights under GDPR and FCA requirements. They expect small businesses to simply roll over and accept their arrogance.

I have already moved to another provider, and my clients are moving away from GoCardless as well. The service has become notorious for shutting down accounts without explanation, and now I have experienced it first-hand.

If you value your business continuity, compliance, and customer support, stay away from GoCardless. There are far better, more transparent alternatives available.

I set up an account with gocardless, for it to only be closed a week later with no explanation at all. The email sent out was their typical generic email, I tried to call the relevant department and I was told they can only be reached by email. It’s disappointing as I had spent £2000 on leaflets with their QR code they give you printed on the front of them, needless to say these all had to be binned as gocardless had deactivated the QR code.

I suspected it may have been because I registered as self-employed, and had heard that gocardless only like dealing with limited companies, with that in mind and the matter that gocardless don’t provide you with eligibility criteria and even a reason for shutting an account down. I decided to try via setting up a limited company, again this time it was immediately shut down. Now, their generic response to comments on here is that they conduct out verification checks and AML checks. All of which I passed when setting up this company. Furthermore, I have excellent credit history, never laundered money. However, due to the absolute poor communication via gocardless I am essentially left out of pocket.

***update on reply***

As you can see, it’s the same generic response for all. Shocking company!

I tried, like really tried to get to speak to s human but their bot or online helper couldn't understand that basic request. £159.99?! Thankfully my bank didn't pay it!! Obviously they know something that I don't know about GoCardless?! I've no idea, nor for the life of me know how, where, when I ever got involved in a company that "helps" with direct debit payments from customers to your company?! I don't have my own company!! It's all very wrong in so many ways...

Just had an awful experience trying to use these guys to take card payments. Signed up, started using, received payments then got told my account was being looked into but didn’t specify a reason. 5 days later got notified that my account had not passed their “level of satisfaction”, they were closing my account and all payments would be refunded which is highly frustrating as I now have to go and re-ask for payment using a different method. Go Cardless have made me look a right fool thanks to their poor sign up process and not making it clear enough what their requirements are. Perhaps if someone from GoCardless is reading this maybe change the way you operate and do all these “checks” you need to do and outline exactly what your sign up requirements are before you allow new members to go ahead and start collecting payments that they’re due.

Terrible service. They suck in the system and then hold the account. Tried to call them on their Australian land line number but no response. Sent them emails with no response. They collected the customer payments but are not sending it to our account.
Will take class action and also let know AFCA,Australia.
Now you responded on 25/09/2025, only after you were reported to AFCA but my official complaint with AFCA for damages is still pending.

Our company has been using Go Cardless for some time without any issue.
Today I needed some help from Go Cardless support and Sven was very swift to point me in the right direction to sort everything out successfully.

A Grave Warning to Any Business
As a lawyer,I feel compelled—indeed, duty-bound—to warn others of the perils of entrusting their business to GoCardless. In my considered judgment, this company constitutes the very worst imaginable means of collecting payments.
Their customer service is, at best, perfunctory and, at worst, non-existent. Communications are marked by delay, indifference, and an apparent disregard for the commercial realities their failures create. More seriously, GoCardless has failed to release funds within the timeframe it expressly represents, thereby jeopardising cash flow, disrupting operations, and destroying my business relationship with valued customers.
To compound matters, they unilaterally closed my account without reasonable explanation and have refused to remit funds which were already processed and lawfully due to me. Such conduct is not only commercially disastrous but fundamentally unconscionable for a financial intermediary.
In short, GoCardless is a platform that no prudent business should ever use. It offers none of the reliability, transparency, or accountability which one has a right to expect when entrusting a third party with the handling of payments.
I strongly discourage anyone from adopting GoCardless as a means of collecting payments. My demand is simple: release my funds without further delay. Until then, I regard GoCardless not as a facilitator of commerce, but as an impediment to it.

Terrible company. Absolutely no customer service. Looked promising, set ourselves up, and took our first customer payment. Account got flagged and has been under review for weeks, during which we have no received payout and our customer has been through a verification process with GoCardless for absolutely no reason. Totally lost our relationship with our customer as we looked like amateurs because of GoCardless. Lost us money, time and trust. Shocking

The should be called NoSupportness. Have tried to reach out to them repeatedly (at least 4 times), giving them 1 star every time they send me an automated survey and I still can't get a response from them. Straight garbage.