Upgrading with Instant Access

[Julianna]

Hello

I want to setup my membership with the following levels:

1 – Forum only. $10/yr
2 – Basic membership. $19/month
3 – VIP membership. $197/year

The difference between the basic and VIP membership benefits is delivered by email, so setting up that upgrade was straightforward.

What I’d like help with is upgrading members from 1 to 2 or 1 to 3.

Right now level 1 is setup to expire after a year on a subscription basis. From the documentation, it looks like if they upgrade mid-term to level 2 or 3, those benefits won’t start until after their level 1 membership expires.

Is that the case? Is there another way to set this up so that members in level 1 instantly get access to level 2 or 3, but members in level 2 get a year added to their active month?

Thanks
Julianna

[The Assurer]

When you upgrade from one level to the next, the new level take effect, when the payment is processed by SWPM; and the new membership level replaces the old one.

HOWEVER, on the payment processing side (PayPal, et al), the older subscription will “keep going” in concurrence with the new one. In the worst case, you might have a case where multiple recurring subscription payments occur; one for each membership level.

If you intend to allow people to upgrade, set the memberships using a “Buy Now” button for a period of 1 year. That way, the memberships have a chance to “die” on their own accord.

[Julianna]

This is really helpful, thank you.

I think the “Buy Now” button workflow will work really well for the annual subscriptions, but I worry about retention for the monthly subscriptions if they have to manually renew every month.

For a monthly reoccurring subscription using the new PayPal PPCP API Subscription and the new Stripe SCA Subscription buttons, would it work if I ask them to use the cancellation button (https://simple-membership-plugin.com/show-active-subscriptions-and-providing-a-cancellation-option/) to cancel their monthly before switching to an annual membership?

[The Assurer]

… would it work if I ask them to use the cancellation button (https://simple-membership-plugin.com/show-active-subscriptions-and-providing-a-cancellation-option/) to cancel their monthly before switching to an annual membership?

It is irrelevant whether the existing subscription agreement is terminated before or after the upgrade to the new level.
https://simple-membership-plugin.com/creating-membership-upgrade-button/#:~:text=handling%20upgrade%20when%20using%20subscription%20type%20payments

[Julianna]

That’s helpful, thank you!

[Author]

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