Managing subscriptions
Once a subscription is running, you manage it from its detail page. From there you can pause it, cancel it, extend it, review its full history, and see the card behind it. Customers can also manage their own subscriptions in the customer portal, within limits you set. This guide covers both sides.
For how subscriptions start and bill, see How subscriptions work.
Finding a subscription
Open the Subscriptions page to see every subscription. Each row shows the next charge amount, a status badge, the billing cycle, the product, the customer, and when it started. You can filter the list by status (Active, Paused, Cancelled, Past due) and sort it. Click any row to open that subscription's detail page.
Pausing and resuming
On an active subscription, click Pause subscription in the Actions panel. While paused, no charges happen. The important part is that pausing extends the billing period by however long the subscription stays paused, so the customer never loses time they already paid for.
When you are ready, click Resume subscription. Billing continues on the adjusted schedule.
Cancelling
To end a subscription, click Cancel subscription. From the dashboard, cancellation always takes effect at the end of the current billing period, not right away. The customer keeps access until the period ends, and is not charged again. Until then the status shows as cancelling.
Because it is scheduled rather than immediate, you can undo it. While a subscription is in the cancelling state, a Resume subscription button appears that calls off the cancellation and keeps it active.
Once a subscription has fully ended, its status becomes cancelled. You can bring it back with Reactivate subscription, which starts a new billing period from today and charges on the next billing date.
There is no immediate-cancel button in the dashboard. If you need to end a subscription on the spot rather than at period end, that is available through the API.
Extending with free days
The Add free days action pushes the next billing date back by a number of days you choose (1 to 365), giving the customer more time before their next charge. This is covered in How subscriptions work.
The event timeline
Every subscription detail page has an Activity Timeline showing its full history in order. Events include:
- Subscription created
- Payment charged (each renewal)
- Payment failed
- Subscription paused and resumed
- Subscription reactivated
- Subscription cancelled
- Free days added
- Payment method updated
This gives you a complete record of what happened and when, which is useful for answering customer questions or investigating a billing issue.
Payment method on file
The subscription receipt shows the card (or bank account) that renewals are charged to, with its brand and last four digits. This is the payment method saved when the customer subscribed.
You cannot change this card from the dashboard. The customer updates it themselves in the portal (see below). This keeps card details in the customer's hands and out of your dashboard.
Customer self-service in the portal
Customers manage their own subscriptions in the customer portal. Each subscription there has the same receipt and timeline, plus actions:
- Cancel subscription: schedules cancellation at the end of the period, exactly like the dashboard.
- Reactivate subscription: available once cancelled, starts a fresh billing period.
- Change card: switches the subscription to another of the customer's saved payment methods. This is how a customer updates the card behind a subscription. It only appears if they have a saved card to switch to.
- Pause and resume: only available if you allow it. Turn on Allow customers to pause subscriptions in Settings > Payments to give customers this option. When it is off, only you can pause from the dashboard.
Letting customers self-serve reduces support requests, while the pause setting lets you decide whether pausing is something they can do on their own.