When a subscription payment fails

This article covers what happens once automatic retries are enabled. Without them, a failed payment simply leaves an outstanding balance for you to chase.

The processing fee

If you've enabled a processing fee, it's added the moment the failure is recorded, as a debit against the customer's balance.

It isn't a payment taken on its own. DoDays never attempts to collect the fee separately - it sits on the balance and is settled when you reconcile the account, alongside everything else the customer owes.

Your customer is told

The customer is emailed straight away. The email confirms the fee where one applies, names the date DoDays will try again, and asks them to check their payment details.

Once the attempts run out, that same email tells them you'll be in touch instead.

The re-attempt

After your retry delay has passed, DoDays re-attempts the payment against the payment method already on the account.

One missed collection is re-attempted per recorded failure - the most recent month's. A customer several collections behind isn't chased for the whole arrears in one go. The remainder stays on their balance for you to resolve.

If that re-attempt also fails, a further fee is added, the customer is emailed again, and the cycle repeats until you reach your attempt cap.

Where the fee appears

A fee shows in the Debits card of two balance reports: the customer's, and that of the student the subscription is for. Open either with View balance report on their record.

TIP

That's one fee shown twice, not charged twice. The customer balance and the student balance are two views of the same money, so the fee moves both by the same amount.

When we stop

At the cap, DoDays stops retrying and the payment moves to manual resolution.