The inactivity fee on dormant custodial accounts: what it is, who it affects, how refunds work

In early September Blink notified the first batch of affected inactive users that a $1 monthly fee would apply to their custodial balance from October. Further batches are notified on the 1st of each month as accounts pass the twelve-month mark. Here is how the fee works.

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The short version

It applies only to custodial accounts with no activity for twelve consecutive months. If you have opened the app or made a payment in the last year, it does not apply to you and cannot be charged to you.

It is $1 per month per balance — the Bitcoin Balance and the Dollar Balance are charged separately. It is never more than the balance itself, and it stops when the balance reaches zero. The amount will also be shown in the app's Fee Schedule in the coming weeks.

Every fee is refunded automatically, in full, the moment the account's owner comes back: all of it, on both balances, with nothing to request and no approval needed. An account whose balances have reached zero and that then stays untouched for a further twelve months is closed, with at least 30 days' notice; even then the fees and the balance remain yours and are returned through the claims process.

This does not apply to non-custodial Blink accounts.

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Why

Like any service that has been around for years, Blink carries accounts whose owners stopped using them long ago and left a balance behind. Every one of them costs money to carry, every month: ledger and infrastructure, retention of verification records, compliance monitoring and reporting, and the support and claims process we maintain so that anyone can recover a balance at any time. Until September, active users were paying all of that. The fee moves a small part of the cost of a dormant account onto the dormant account, and gives its owner a reason to come back, withdraw, or migrate. An account that returns pays nothing.

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How it works, step by step

1. An account becomes dormant twelve consecutive calendar months after its last activity. Activity means anything you do with the account: logging in, opening the app on a logged-in device, an API call, sending or receiving a payment, or moving funds between your balances. Entries Blink makes on your behalf — fees, refunds, credits — do not count.
2. On the 1st of each month, dormant accounts with a positive balance receive a notice in the app. Nothing is charged until that notice is at least 31 days old.
3. Once a month, the fee is charged to each balance: $1, or the whole balance if it holds less than $1. The charge is visible in the transaction history, with the rate used.
4. The charge repeats monthly for as long as the balance is above zero and the account stays dormant. At zero it stops.
5. When the owner returns — one login or one app open is enough — every fee ever charged to that account is refunded automatically, and they receive a message confirming the amounts.
6. If both balances have reached zero and the account then sees no activity for a further twelve months, Blink may close it, with at least 30 days' notice in the app: the username and Lightning address are retired and the records are kept. Any use of the account before the closure date cancels it. Closure does not remove the refund right; the fees come back through the claims process.
7. Accounts that Blink has locked or otherwise restricted are not charged. Accounts in regions where we are winding down custodial service are not charged while their exit window is open; after the deadline, a residual balance is treated like any other dormant balance, and moving it out stays free.

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The dates

• 30–31 August 2026: proposed by our Chief Compliance Officer and approved by the Board.
• 2 September: the updated Terms and Conditions published (version 2.5, section 9.2).
• 3 September: notice sent to custodial accounts with no activity for twelve months. Roughly one in ten of that batch went in error to accounts that were in fact active, because the first sizing used an obsolete login field; those accounts were sent a correction the next day, removed from the charge list, and none of them was charged.
• 4 September: Terms and Conditions version 2.6 published — a plain-language rewrite of the same terms.
• 1 October: second batch of notices.
• 6 October: the first charge.
• 25 October: notice sent to every other custodial account, including active accounts to which the fee does not apply. Accounts already notified as dormant keep their original notice.
• Coming weeks: the fee shown in the app under Settings → Fee rates.

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If you have a dormant account

Open the app and log in. That is all it takes: anything charged is refunded on the spot. If you'd rather close the account, withdrawing the balance and migrating it to a non-custodial Blink account are both free. If you can't get into the app, write to support@blink.sv: the claims process returns the fees together with your balance, including after an account has been closed. The fee is never a barrier to getting your money back.

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Where to find it

The fee is in section 9.2 of the Terms and Conditions (version 2.6). In the coming weeks the amount will also be shown in the app under Settings → Fee rates.

Questions: support@blink.sv