A member has cancelled their membership but still got charged. Why is that?
They are a few things to take into consideration.
- The Payments Notice Period.
Advance Notice must be provided to the payer before any collections are taken from an account and the length of the Direct Debit notice depends on what has been agreed with the sponsoring bank. If you are unsure what time period your organisation has, you can check the information contained within your Direct Debit Guarantee as it has to state this time period.
Typically, the default period (the time allowed for receipt of the Advance Notice by the payer) is a minimum of 10 working days plus postal time. If your organisation has not requested anything different to this you will typically be required to give 10 days’ Direct Debit notice.
- The Cancellation Notice Period
Typically, most clients have it set at 30 days but you can set a lower or higher value. - The Billing Date
You can check that on the customer record in their billing tab, under their current Instruction or previous payments. - The Cancellation Date
What date did they cancel their membership? You can check that in their membership tab. Click on the membership status. - Do they have a month in hand (paid for the last month at the time of purchase.
You can check this in the Membership Tab. - Membership Start Date.
You can check this on their membership tab
Use Case scenario 1:
Customer's billing date is on 1st of the month.
Customer cancelled their membership on June 25th
Payment Notice period is 10 working days
Cancellation Notice Period is 30 days.
Membership Start Date is 1st of the month
No Month in Hand
=> Last payment for the customer will be August 1st and the last of their membership will August 31st.
Use Case scenario 2:
Customer's billing date is on the 15th of month
Customer cancelled their membership on June 25th
Payment Notice period is 10 working days
Cancellation Notice Period is 30 days.
Membership Start date is 1st of the Month
No Month in Hand
=> Last payment for the customer will be July 15th and the last day of their membership will July 31st
Use Case scenario 3:
Customer's billing date is on the 15th of the month
Customer cancelled their membership on June 1st
Payment Notice period is 10 working days
Cancellation Notice Period is 10 days.
Membership Start date is 1st of the Month
No Month in Hand
=> Last payment for the customer will be June 15th and the last day of their membership will June 30th
Use Case scenario 4:
Customer's billing date is on the 1st of the month
Customer cancelled their membership on June 25th
Payment Notice period is 10 working days
Cancellation Notice Period is 30 days.
Membership Start date is 1st of the Month
Customer has a Month in Hand
=> Last payment for the customer will be July 1st and the last day of their membership will August 31st.
Please note: customers can cancel their mandate at the bank to avoid further billing
In these cases, the payment would probably still get submitted by Flow, but ultimately rejected.
if it’s too close (within a day or so), the customer may still get billed - they would need to check with their bank.