About Account Renewal Notification Email

[makoki]

I’m not receiving account renewal notification emails from PayPal.
I do receive account renewal notification emails from Stripe.
I have set up PayPal’s webhook and all other emails are arriving properly. What should I do?

[The Assurer]

Since Stripe renewal notification emails are working correctly, that tells us a few important things:
✅ Your WordPress email sending is working.
✅ The Simple Membership plugin email system is functioning.
✅ Your server can send renewal emails properly.

So this issue is almost certainly related specifically to the PayPal subscription renewal notification process.
Let’s go through this step-by-step.

1️⃣ Confirm PayPal IPN (Not Just Webhook)
For PayPal subscription renewals, the plugin relies on PayPal IPN (Instant Payment Notification) — not webhooks.
Even if other PayPal emails are arriving, renewal processing depends on IPN correctly sending the subscr_payment event back to your site.
Please check:
PayPal Account → Settings → Website Payments → Instant Payment Notifications
Make sure:
IPN is enabled
The IPN URL is set to:
https://yoursite.com/?swpm_process_ipn=1
(Replace yoursite.com with your actual domain.)

2️⃣ Enable Debug Logging (Very Important)
This will tell us whether PayPal is even notifying your site.
Please follow this guide:
👉 https://simple-membership-plugin.com/enable-debug-logging/
Then:
Wait for a renewal payment to occur.
Check the debug log file.
Look for:
IPN received
subscr_payment
Any errors related to PayPal
If nothing appears in the log during renewal, then PayPal is not notifying your site.

3️⃣ Check the Subscription Type
Important question:
Are you using a PayPal subscription button created via the Simple Membership plugin?
Or was the subscription created directly inside PayPal?
The plugin must create the subscription button so it can track the subscription reference properly.
If the subscription was created manually in PayPal, renewal emails will not be triggered by the plugin.

4️⃣ Confirm the Email Settings
Go to:
WP Admin → WP Membership → Settings → Email Settings

Check:
Is “Send Notification to Member on Account Renewal” enabled?
Is the renewal email template configured properly?
Since Stripe works, this is likely correct — but good to double check.

4️⃣ Confirm the Email Settings
Go to:
WP Admin → WP Membership → Settings → Email Settings
Check:
Is “Send Notification to Member on Account Renewal” enabled?
Is the renewal email template configured properly?
Since Stripe works, this is likely correct — but good to double check.

5️⃣ Common Cause: PayPal Renewal Not Linked to Member Record
Sometimes renewals fail to send emails because:
The subscription reference is missing
The member record cannot be matched
The renewal becomes an “orphaned” subscription
If you see messages like:
Could not find member record for this subscription
Then this guide will help:
https://simple-membership-plugin.com/subscription-payment-troubleshooting-orphaned-subscription-management/

[makoki]

Thank you!

I solved this problem by turn off test mode.

First, I turn on paypal ipn function.

But even when I turned that ipn off, I still received account renewal notification emails.

Thank you.

[Author]

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