Subscription Checkout And Renewals

How a subscription checkout splits into two orders, and how renewals, declines and stock are handled.

Updated September 29, 2026

On this page

Checkout

A cart can hold subscription lines and one-time lines together. At checkout it becomes two orders:

A buy-once order for the one-time lines, charged and shipped as usual.
A subscription order for the subscription lines. This is delivery 1: it is charged at checkout, on the card being saved, and ships free.

Saving the card is required when the cart contains a subscription, because later deliveries are charged to it. A subscription only starts once its first delivery has been paid.

Discount codes at a split checkout: a percentage code applies to both orders; a fixed-amount code applies to the first order and any remainder to the second. The code's usage is counted once. Renewals are never charged with a discount code.

Renewals

When. The billing run checks for due subscriptions every 30 minutes and charges a delivery on its due date in the store's local time zone, so a delivery is never charged the evening before.
What. The price per delivery, plus tax where your store's tax setting applies it. Renewal deliveries ship free. A successful charge creates a real, itemised paid order, tagged with its delivery number, that goes through your normal fulfilment.
Safe to re-run. Right before charging, the subscription is re-read and locked, and must still be active, due, on an active offering, in stock and allowed to ship to the customer's state. A pause, skip or cancel made during a run stops the charge. After a long outage, catch-up is a single charge: the next date moves forward on the original cadence, and missed deliveries never stack up.
Card fallback. A renewal tries the subscription's card, then the customer's default card, then every other saved card. The first that goes through pays and becomes the subscription's card from then on.
Declines. Only when every saved card is declined is it a failed payment. The first failure emails the customer to update their card and retries 2 days later. If the retry also fails, the subscription stops (is suspended), and the customer is emailed and can re-enable it from their account. Re-enabling never charges on the spot; the next delivery is on schedule.
Shipping restrictions. If the product can no longer be sold to the customer's state, the subscription is paused instead of charged.

Declines, skips and other deliveries that did not happen are recorded in the subscription's history, not as orders, so fulfilment never sees an order it must not ship.

Stock

Heads-up. Every morning (9 AM Eastern), subscribers whose next delivery is 1 to 3 days away and out of stock are emailed a heads-up listing in-stock alternatives at the same frequency, so they can switch.
Skip. If the item is still out of stock on the day, that delivery is skipped with no charge, the customer is emailed, and the next date moves on by one interval.
Staff alert. Owners, admins and staff with inventory permission are alerted directly about a skipped delivery. This alert is always sent and does not depend on notification preferences.

Next Steps

Checkout

A cart can hold subscription lines and one-time lines together. At checkout it becomes two orders:

A buy-once order for the one-time lines, charged and shipped as usual.

A subscription order for the subscription lines. This is delivery 1: it is charged at checkout, on the card being saved, and ships free.

Saving the card is required when the cart contains a subscription, because later deliveries are charged to it. A subscription only starts once its first delivery has been paid.

Renewals

When. The billing run checks for due subscriptions every 30 minutes and charges a delivery on its due date in the store's local time zone, so a delivery is never charged the evening before.

What. The price per delivery, plus tax where your store's tax setting applies it. Renewal deliveries ship free. A successful charge creates a real, itemised paid order, tagged with its delivery number, that goes through your normal fulfilment.

Safe to re-run. Right before charging, the subscription is re-read and locked, and must still be active, due, on an active offering, in stock and allowed to ship to the customer's state. A pause, skip or cancel made during a run stops the charge. After a long outage, catch-up is a single charge: the next date moves forward on the original cadence, and missed deliveries never stack up.

Card fallback. A renewal tries the subscription's card, then the customer's default card, then every other saved card. The first that goes through pays and becomes the subscription's card from then on.

Declines. Only when every saved card is declined is it a failed payment. The first failure emails the customer to update their card and retries 2 days later. If the retry also fails, the subscription stops (is suspended), and the customer is emailed and can re-enable it from their account. Re-enabling never charges on the spot; the next delivery is on schedule.

Shipping restrictions. If the product can no longer be sold to the customer's state, the subscription is paused instead of charged.

Declines, skips and other deliveries that did not happen are recorded in the subscription's history, not as orders, so fulfilment never sees an order it must not ship.

Stock

Heads-up. Every morning (9 AM Eastern), subscribers whose next delivery is 1 to 3 days away and out of stock are emailed a heads-up listing in-stock alternatives at the same frequency, so they can switch.

Skip. If the item is still out of stock on the day, that delivery is skipped with no charge, the customer is emailed, and the next date moves on by one interval.

Staff alert. Owners, admins and staff with inventory permission are alerted directly about a skipped delivery. This alert is always sent and does not depend on notification preferences.