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paying upfront for 6 or 12 months of a monthly subscription

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Wei

04 Oct, 2012 09:14 PM

How does CheddarGetter handle data for plans where buyers pay upfront for 6 or 12 months of a monthly subscription?

We are searching for a serving that would help us manage and track our customers that pay upfront for 6 or 12 months of our monthly subscription IN ADDITION to the customers who are paying month-to-month.

Currently we are using Recurly and it doesn't do a great job of it. So we're looking for an alternate solution.

Wei

1. Support Staff 1 Posted by Marc Guyer on 04 Oct, 2012 09:55 PM

   

   Hi Wie -- That's no problem. CheddarGetter handles this with different pricing plans. You'd have a plan that bills every month, another that bills every 6, and another that bills every 12. Customers can switch between them freely. Can you describe how Recurly doesn't handle this well? Maybe if I understood that, I could more accurately answer your question.

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2. 2 Posted by Wei on 05 Oct, 2012 10:05 PM

   

   Thanks for your reply Mark..
   Here's a more detailed description of our issue(s)...

   We have 3 plans:
   A. pay-as-you-go. pay monthly, product delivered monthly. recurs until cancelled.
   B. 6-months pay-upfront, product delivered monthly. does NOT automatically re-bill at the end of 6-months (we set it to bill for just 1 cycle, is this right?)
   C. 12-months pay-upfront, product delivered monthly. does NOT automatically re-bill at the end of 6-months (we set it to bill for just 1 cycle, is this right?)

   It seems possible for one subscriber "Bob" to purchase plan A for himself, and then, maybe a month later. on the same credit card, purchase Plan B as a gift for Friend #1 else. is this right?

   Is it possible for Bob to decide two months later to purchase ANOTHER Plan B for Friend #2, on the same or different credit card that all the rest of his plans are on?
   If so, can you walk us (and our developer) through
   how to properly set this up?
   What would it look like for us on the dashboard and/or as managers of the account to tailor e-mail notifications etc. to Bob to let him know when PLan B Friend #1 is expiring vs. Plan B Friend #2...
   If, it's only partially true, can you help explain further?
   If not, is there something in the works that would support this?

   ANY insight you could give us would be great. thanks!
   .w.

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3. Support Staff 3 Posted by Marc Guyer on 07 Oct, 2012 08:11 PM

   

   A. pay-as-you-go. pay monthly, product delivered monthly. recurs until cancelled.

   No problem. Normal monthly plan.

   B. 6-months pay-upfront, product delivered monthly. does NOT automatically re-bill at the end of 6-months (we set it to bill for just 1 cycle, is this right?) C. 12-months pay-upfront, product delivered monthly. does NOT automatically re-bill at the end of 6-months (we set it to bill for just 1 cycle, is this right?)

   These can both be handled the same way with "non-recurring" plans. http://support.cheddargetter.com/kb/pricing-plans/pricing-plan-basi...

   It seems possible for one subscriber "Bob" to purchase plan A for himself, and then, maybe a month later. on the same credit card, purchase Plan B as a gift for Friend #1 else. is this right?

   Yes. This would be a separate customer record. The payment method would need to be reentered by the gift giver.

   Is it possible for Bob to decide two months later to purchase ANOTHER Plan B for Friend #2, on the same or different credit card that all the rest of his plans are on?

   Yes, just like the previous scenario.

   If so, can you walk us (and our developer) through how to properly set this up?

   Just shoot us questions here as you're working through how you want to do it. We're here to help.

   What would it look like for us on the dashboard and/or as managers of the account to tailor e-mail notifications etc. to Bob to let him know when PLan B Friend #1 is expiring vs. Plan B Friend #2...

   Off the top of my head, I'm not sure how CG could help with communicating with Bob after the gift is given. Don't you want the friend to convert and start paying? CG can help with that with the BIll Reminder email as mentioned above.

   What would it look like for us on the dashboard and/or as managers of the account to tailor e-mail notifications etc.

   The email templates are fully customizable with embedded variables. You could even change the message content when the subscription is a gift.

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4. 4 Posted by wei fang on 08 Oct, 2012 07:38 PM

   

   HI Marc:

   Thanks so much for your replies.
   Just wanted to clarify one thing from the Q&A with you:

   *> It seems possible for one subscriber "Bob" to purchase plan A for
   himself, and then, maybe a month later. on the same credit card, purchase
   Plan B as a gift for Friend #1 else. is this right?*
   *
   *
   *Yes. This would be a separate customer record. The payment method would
   need to be reentered by the gift giver.*

   What do you mean by "separate customer record"? Does it mean that on Bob's
   end, he'd have to create a new account and login/password (in addition to
   the one he already has) in order to purchase additional subscriptions
   (either as gift or for himself) at later dates?

   We are trying to keep things as simple as possible for the end-user, so
   would like to avoid having them create separate accounts each time they
   want to make a purchase through us.

   THANK YOU!!
   .w.

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5. 5 Posted by wei fang on 08 Oct, 2012 08:09 PM

   

   Hi Marc:

   Forgot to add....

   After chatting with our Developer, we just wanted to make sure some things
   about handling the customer CC information...

      1. For instance, when a customer enters their billing information, would
      they have to leave our site to do so?
      2. Does customer credit card information come into our hands at any
      point?
      3. Can you explain what you mean by "multiple currency" support? ARe
      there certain currencies, all currencies, is there an extra charge to take
      non-USD$ transactions? Do we have to set-up add'l merchant accounts in
      order to accept other currencies via the CheddarGateway?

   Thanks - we really appreciate your responses -as you can see we're just
   getting ourselves set-up and this is all really helpful!

   Wei

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6. 6 Posted by adam on 10 Oct, 2012 03:10 PM

   

   Hi Wei,

   1. No, you can use our API to build your own forms and host them on your site. Or alternatively you can embed our hosted payment page in an iframe on your site.
   2. If you use our API, yes you would likely pass card data to us through your own system. If you embed via iframe, no.
   3. CG is currency agnostic, and our gateway is capable of handling virtually all supported currencies. You are correct that you would need to find a merchant account that can handle the currencies you desire to process. Some of them can handle multiple currencies themselves. Payvision is one example that we happen to have a great relationship with.

   Hope that helps,
   Adam

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7. 7 Posted by wei fang on 11 Oct, 2012 12:04 AM

   

   THanks for your answer Adam...

   I also asked an earlier questions that we're still waiting for
   clarification on... copied again below...

   From earlier Q&A...
   "It seems possible for one subscriber "Bob" to purchase plan A for
   himself, and then, maybe a month later. on the same credit card, purchase
   Plan B as a gift for Friend #1 else. is this right?*
   *
   *Yes. This would be a separate customer record. The payment method would
   need to be reentered by the gift giver.*"

   What do you mean by "separate customer record"? Does it mean that on Bob's
   end, he'd have to create a new account and login/password (in addition to
   the one he already has), and/or re-enter credit card info, in order to
   purchase additional subscriptions
   (either as gift or for himself) at later dates?

   Any clarification would help...
   thanks!
   .w.

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8. 8 Posted by adam on 11 Oct, 2012 04:18 PM

   

   Hi,

   Yes, a single customer cannot have multiple subscriptions under a single customer record. He would need to create a new account for the gift subscription.

   Adam

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9. Dean closed this discussion on 23 Jan, 2013 04:42 PM.