#poxules-subscriptions
ivory kernel
hi! not sure I completely understand but I don't think your mental model aligns with how Stripe subscriptions actually work. Prices/Products don't have an end-date or period of time. A Price can recur daily/weekly/monthly/yearly (https://stripe.com/docs/api/prices/object#price_object-recurring-interval), for ever. So off the bat, I don't know how your "semester" or 3/6 month plans actually work in Stripe and how you build that concept of a 'period' and what API calls or set up you use there.
If a customer changes their subscription in the customer portal, that takes effect immediately yes, they move from whatever Price they are currently on, to the one they pick.
modest pumice
Totally agree regarding the Price and Products doesn't have end-date. This responsibility should be part of subscriptions
The thing is, What happens when you have paid a subscription by 1 year, and 6 months later you update it to another "product/price". This occurs immediately as you said, but it doesn't take into account that the customer has already paid 6 months. So the customer, is double paying for 6 months. (half of old anual subscription plus the updated subscription)
ivory kernel
but it doesn't take into account that the customer has already paid 6 months.
it would if you enable proration.
one of the settings for the CustomerPortal is whether or not to prorate changes, if you have that enabled then the customer gets invoice items for refunding time on the old plan and charging pro-rata on the new plan. You should experiment with that