uncle_best-practices

[raven epoch]

👋 Welcome to your new thread!

⏲️ We'll be here soon! Typically we respond in a few minutes, but sometimes we might take a bit longer if the server is busy or if you have a particularly tricky question.

⏱️ We close idle threads, which makes them read-only. Once a thread is closed it won't be reopened, but you can always start a new thread if you have another question.

🔗 This thread will always be available, even after it's closed. You can find it again using Discord's search, or you can save this link: https://discord.com/channels/841573134531821608/1374213998370881596

📝 Have more to share? Add more details, code, screenshots, videos, etc. below.

[rotund valve]

hello! I have a couple of questions for you :

• It sounds like you want to charge your customers for the number of storage units they use, is that right? for example, a customer can add new storage units throughout the month, and at the end of the month, they will be billed for the number of storage units they used?
• what do you expect to happen if a customer adds more storage units in the middle of a billing cycle? i.e. do you expect to prorate the customers? or do you just charge them for what they've used at the end of the month (no proration)?

[quick quarry]

A customer signs a lease for a unit on 5/4/25 and then they would owe again on 6/4/25. Each unit would be a separate autopay subscription

So if they add a unit they would need to sign up for auto pay on that unit

There is no proration

I think I'm kinda trying to force subscription to work for me and I'm not sure it's the right model

I really don't expect customers to have more than one unit at a time

but I suppose it's possible

[rotund valve]

so one subscription per unit?

[quick quarry]

yes

[rotund valve]

hmmm, i think it's worth considering. Can you share more on why you want to "backdate"?

[quick quarry]

Signing up for the subscription is optional. I would like to be able to present the option to the customer at any point in their billing cycle but not charge them till the end of their billing cycle

[rotund valve]

aaaaah, okay i think i get it now

so in essence, you're just trying to make paying easier for your customers

[quick quarry]

so if their lease is due on 5/4/25 and they sign up for the subscription on 4/23/25 they shouldn't be charged till 5/4/25

[rotund valve]

they might have signed for a lease on 5/4/25, but only sign up for autopay on 10/4/25

[quick quarry]

yes

I would like for them to be able to manage whether their autopaying through stripe or paying via another method

[rotund valve]

gimme a while to test things out and get back to you

[quick quarry]

Thanks!

[rotund valve]

hrm, i think you can use subscriptions, it just somewhat complicated to implement if you want to charge at the end of the month. So the only pricing model that allows you to charge at the end of the month is usage based billing : https://docs.stripe.com/billing/subscriptions/usage-based - you would get the customer to subscribe to a subscription, i believe you would backdate and also set the billing_cycle_anchor_config. After the customer signs up for the subscription, you would send an event to add one usage. And you would need to do this every time the subscription renews.

It would be a lot less complicated if you charged the customer upfront i.e. at the beginning of the subscription instead of the end

is that something which you can or would consider changing to? namely, charging the customer upfront?