#obo-bca-subs
void dune
vague escarp
Hi there 👋 it depends on the update being performed.
void dune
I have some instances in our system where we updated the subscription to subscribe to a new product and it seems to have reset the billing cycle
for example: https://dashboard.stripe.com/logs/req_iuSutCdQxsTR8O
I did not pass in anything for billing_cycle_anchor, but yet stripe seemed to reset it
vague escarp
Did the Prices have different billing frequencies?
void dune
no, still monthly
you can see the webhook generated here if interested: https://dashboard.stripe.com/events/evt_1OI2qiEUqHBlqQXGsbVZOjES
specifically, the user used to be billed on the second of the month and now gets billed on the 29th
but our code does not pass in anything for billing_cycle_anchor, so we're curious why the cycle shifted
vague escarp
Sorry for the delay, trying to spot which condition was tripped that would have caused the billing cycle anchor to adjust.
void dune
no worries! take your time
twilit onyxBOT
vague escarp
Normally it's either the billing frequency changing, or the Subscription going into/out of a trial that causes that change, but so far I don't think I'm spotting either of those happening.
void dune
that would definitely make sense, but yeah our system doesn't have that behavior
I was wondering if billing_cycle_anchor somehow defaults to now if you don't pass in a value
do I need to deliberately pass in unchanged?
vague escarp
I don't think it does, but I may be mistaken. Do you have a test flow handy (I see the Sub provided above was from livemode) where you would be able to test that easily?
void dune
I could try to whip something together
vague escarp
My only other thought, if I'm reading the history of this Sub correctly, is that deleting the only Subscription Item on the Subscription and then adding all new items may lead to this. I don't think it should, but I'm running out of ideas 😅
void dune
interesting. is there a way to confirm that or possibly dig into that more? Unfortunately this is a pretty important thing for us
vague escarp
It sounds like this wasn't the only Subscription that ran into this, but that you aren't seeing this behavior for every Subscription, do I have that right? If so, I'd be curious to see if you've spotted any pattern amongst the ones where you did see this?
void dune
let me look into things a bit more here, we found this because our system is set up to avoid billing cycles on the 29th, 30th, and 31st of months for consistency purposes. So we pass in billing anchors to avoid this
this may be happening globally, let me check
vague escarp
Thank you, that'll help give us an idea of whether we should be digging into something specific to the state of certain Subscriptions, or something larger.
void dune
from testing on a staging environment, it doesn't seem like I encountered this
but will continue to look around
here's an example of a custom who changed plans, but the cycle stayed the same: https://dashboard.stripe.com/customers/cus_O26K1Rv3qGwS3C
I can provide more examples of customers who did change btw, i have about 20 of them
craggy phoenix
Hi, stepping in and catching up. Please give me some time here.
void dune
wait I think I see something
if you look at the recent activity it seems to go from paid to free and then back to paid in about 8 hours
from looking at other subscriptions that are falling into this category, this seems to be a pattern
this customer goes from free to paid ^
so in other words, does going from free to paid automatically reset the billing period when using the subscription.update method
craggy phoenix
Sorry, I'm still catching up here
void dune
no worries
craggy phoenix
Yes, after looking through these object, I can confirm that when a trial end, https://stripe.com/docs/billing/subscriptions/trials a new billing cycle also begins for the customer.
void dune
so these are not trials, they're ongoing free subscriptions
and when we upgrade those users, we simply upgrade that subscription to a paid subscription in stripe
from stripe's logic, is that the same thing?
I think our issue here is, if that's the case, we don't appear to be able to set a billing cycle anchor using the subscription.update function like we can for subscription.create
which creates a bit of a problem
craggy phoenix
Let me dig around and confirm here for sure
void dune
I appreciate that. If there's a way to go from free to paid via subscription.update without resetting the billing cycle, that would be ideal
craggy phoenix
I was able to confirm that this is rhe current behavior. I'll share your feedback to keep the billing cycle anchor the same when updating from a free price to other prices.
void dune
is it possible to override this? Possibly by passing in "unchanged" for "billing_cycle_anchor" ?
craggy phoenix
There is not a way to override this
void dune
I see, yes if you could please pass this feedback onward that would be appreciated. This presents a pretty big edge case for us
craggy phoenix
Yes, I'll share this feedback
void dune
I think the ideal case would be to just let us pass in an anchor date like we do when creating subscriptions
twilit onyxBOT