Help CenterHere's a comprehensive guide on how to easily manage your clients' auto-renewing memberships
The Problem:
Clients who are on periodic auto-renewal of their memberships, either by credit card, check, or cash, can run into problems where their payment method fails due to insufficient funds, expired credit card, invalid zipcode etc. Please note that we at Fitli, allow you to set up a check or cash auto-renewal, this method is not recommended - as there is no automatic way to renew these accounts when they fail (because there is no credit card to charge, they will fail and their auto-renewing memberships will be paused).
This guide covers failing auto-renewing memberships.
How to Know when you've got a Client with a Failing Membership?
The first way you'll typically see that a client's membership has failed to renew will be an email from us, notifying you of the failure. In the image below, the business has received a notice that a client's payment method has failed:
Heading to your dashboard a.k.a. business calendar, you'll see a message at the top in red indicating you have customers with payment issues. "Click Here" to resolve or visit the Customers section.
"Click Here" will filter the result showing your clients with payment issues. In the example below, there’s only 1 open issue. You’ll also see there is a notice indicating that the client's membership renewal is failing beside your client’s name. You'll see the notice indicated by a red "!" in a circle icon.
Alternatively, heading to the Customers List, you’ll see the "Open Issues (X)" link in red, indicating that X number of clients’ memberships renewal is failing. This will not show up on your customers list if you don’t have any issues with failing auto-renewing memberships. In the example below, there’s only 1 open issue. Click "Open Issues (X)" to filter the result.
You’ll also see there is a notice indicating that the client's membership renewal is failing beside your client’s name. You'll see the notice indicated by a red "!" in a circle icon.
And, then clicking into the customer profile tells you at the top of the Client Profile.
And specifically under the "Auto-Renewing Plans" section with the link "Paused Clicked to Retry".
How to resolve the failed membership auto-renewal?
If the client's credit card is failing or there’s no credit card on file, leading to the emails and messages in the client's account, then either you or the client needs to update their credit card attached to their Personal Account. There are two ways to do this:
Client Updates their Own Credit Card
You (the business) updates the Client's card
Additionally, if the client’s card is on file, you can re-try the charge. To do this, you can either click "Paused Click to Retry" or click "Select Action" then "Retry Failed Charge" under "Auto-Renewing Plans" beside the failing membership.
On the "Paused Recurring Payment" modal, select "Retry", "Cancel", or "Change Next Charge Date".
Retry Failed Charge
On the "Paused Recurring Payment" modal, select "Retry" then click SUBMIT. If the attempted charge was successful, you will see a green confirmation message and the package/membership will be reactivated. Otherwise, you’ll see a message at the top that the attempted charge failed in red.
Screenshots below:
Note: The attempted charge might be successful even though the client has not updated their payment information. This normally happens if the reason for the initial failure to renew is due to insufficient funds or some other temporary issue with the bank account. Once there’s enough funds on the card or the issue with the bank is resolved, the charge will be successful. If the attempted charge failed and your client is unsure of the reason for the failure, please contact us or advise your customer to contact us directly so we can provide more details about the reason for the decline.
Once the charge is successful, you'll receive a purchase email and see the purchase noted in your Sales Report. You'll also see that next renewal/bill date under the "Next Charge" column. If unsuccessful, you'll receive another email that the transaction failed and you'll still see the "Paused Click to Retry" link under the "Next Charge" column. Screenshots below.
Cancel Auto-Renew
You can also CANCEL the auto-renewing membership, which terminates the auto-renewal process and won't continue the attempts at charging the customer.
You can either do it within the "Paused Recurring Payment" modal or by selecting "Cancel Auto-Renew" on the "Select Action" link.
Click Cancel and SUBMIT on the "Paused Recurring Payment" modal to process cancellation.
Or, click "Cancel Auto-Renew" on the "Select Action" link then CONFIRM.
The customer’s profile will refresh and you’ll see that the auto-renewing membership's status has been changed from Active to Pending Cancel. Canceling via the "Select Action" link will NOT reverse any balances that have not been paid for. It will just cancel auto-renew. If you need to to remove the balances, click the number under the "Remaining Sessions Qty" column and adjust the number of sessions or click the "Expiration Date" and expire the membership immediately.
Change Next Charge Date
You can change the next charge date of your client's auto-renewing membership if they're not ready to pay or their payment method is not available for some reason.
To do this, click "Change Next Charge Date", use the date picker to choose a date in the future then hit SUBMIT.
A confirmation message will appear that you successfully updated your client's auto-renewing membership and the "Paused Click to Retry" link will be replaced by the new next charge date.
Allow Instant Re-Charge
Lastly, allowing instant re-charge after your clients’ update their payment method due to a failed transaction is another option. You can edit the auto-renewing membership and turn on the "Allow Instant Re-Charge" toggle. Click HERE for a detailed guide.
You can also activate the feature where your clients can initiate cancellation of their auto-renewing packages/memberships or request cancellation from your business. Click HERE for a detailed guide.
That's about it! Any questions? Chat with us or send us an email to support@fitli.com.