Troubleshooting paid subscription issues

Paid subscriptions on beehiiv are processed through your connected Stripe account. Because beehiiv and Stripe work together to manage billing, access, and subscriber status, most issues fall into a few common patterns. Use this article to identify and resolve the most frequent paid subscription problems.

beehiiv uses two separate types of Stripe accounts, and it's common to have one set up without the other.

• A standard personal Stripe account is required for paid subscriptions and digital products.
• Stripe Express is used for the Ad Network and Boosts Marketplace.

If you've set up Stripe for Boosts or ads, that does not automatically connect Stripe for paid subscriptions.

After connecting Stripe to beehiiv for paid subscriptions and/or digital products, a new account will appear in your Stripe dashboard. To access it, log in to Stripe and click your account name in the top left corner, then select the account associated with your paid subscriptions.

If no account is connected in the Paid Tiers tab of your Paid subscriptions, click Connect to Stripe to connect the correct account.

The beehiiv migration tool copies your active subscriptions from your old Stripe account into the new one connected to beehiiv — but it does not automatically cancel billing in your previous platform or Stripe account.

After migration, you must manually pause or cancel active subscriptions in your old account to avoid charging subscribers twice.

The steps for doing this vary depending on where your subscribers were originally managed:

• How to migrate from Substack to beehiiv
• How to migrate from Ghost to beehiiv
• How to migrate from Kit to beehiiv
• Additional migrating to beehiiv guides

A higher-than-expected payment failure rate can be common, especially after migrating from another platform. Your new Stripe account doesn't have the payment history that your previous account had, so expired or at-risk cards are more likely to fail on the first attempt. 

In your old Stripe account, expired cards could sometimes still be charged successfully for extended periods of time because of their prior successful payment history. Your new Stripe account doesn't yet have that history, so expired cards will fail on the first payment attempt.

Common causes of failed or incomplete payments:

• Card declines: The subscriber's bank declined the charge. This is the most common reason and is outside your control.
• Expired cards: Cards that previously charged successfully may fail on a new Stripe account before the network updates the card details.
• 3D Secure (3DS) prompts: Some cards, particularly in Europe, require the subscriber to complete an extra authentication step. If they abandon this step, the payment shows as incomplete in Stripe.
• Stripe risk blocks: Stripe may flag and block certain payments based on its own fraud detection rules.

To reduce payment failures, we recommend setting up revenue recovery notifications in Stripe:

1. In your Stripe dashboard, go to Revenue recovery > Emails.
2. Toggle on Send emails when card payments fail.
3. Toggle on Send emails about expiring cards.

Both toggles are off by default when a new Stripe account is created. Enabling them prompts Stripe to notify subscribers directly when their payment fails or their card is about to expire, giving them a chance to update their payment method.

For persistent issues with 3D Secure or regional payment methods, contact Stripe support directly, as these settings are managed within Stripe.

Our system links subscriber records between beehiiv and Stripe using email addresses. If those don't match exactly, the paid status won't sync correctly.

Check these common causes:

• Email mismatch: The email address on the subscriber's Stripe record is different from the one on their beehiiv account. Even a single typo will break the link.
• Duplicate subscriber records: The subscriber signed up more than once, and the paid subscription is attached to a different record than the one receiving your emails.
• Refund or cancellation broke the link: A manual refund or cancellation in Stripe can sometimes disconnect the beehiiv – Stripe subscriber link.

To investigate:

1. From the left panel dashboard, go to Audience > Subscribers.
2. Search for the subscriber by email address.
3. Check their subscription status and the email address on their profile.
4. In Stripe, open the customer record for that subscriber and confirm the email address and subscription status match.

If the records don't match or the link is broken, use our chatbot Buzz to help you reach out to beehiiv support with the subscriber's beehiiv email address and their Stripe customer or subscription ID.

Cancellations and refunds for paid subscriptions must be processed directly in your connected Stripe account. Making changes in beehiiv alone — such as turning off a paid tier — does not stop Stripe from billing.

To cancel or refund a subscription:

1. Log in to your Stripe dashboard.
2. Search for the subscriber by name or email address.
3. Open their customer profile.
4. Select the active subscription and cancel it, or navigate to the relevant payment and issue a refund.

If a subscriber ended up with duplicate subscriptions (for example, from clicking the upgrade button more than once), before cancelling in Stripe, confirm which subscription is linked to the subscriber in beehiiv. Cancelling the wrong subscription will remove their paid access in beehiiv.

To see the connected Stripe account in beehiiv:

1. Go to Audience > Subscribers, and then click on their email to open the subscriber’s profile. 
2. The Stripe Link is listed under their Unique referral link. Click Copy to save it to your clipboard.
   
   
   
3. Once confirmed, cancel the duplicate in Stripe and issue a refund for any extra charges.

The text that appears on your Stripe checkout page, including the product name, description, and the ‘handled by beehiiv’ line, are controlled by your Stripe product settings, not by beehiiv.

To update your product name or description in Stripe:

1. Log in to your Stripe dashboard.
2. Go to your Product Catalog and click on the product name (for example, Live, Laugh, AI - beehiiv Monthly).
   
   
   
3. Select Edit product.
   
   
   
4. Update the Name and Description fields as needed, then click Update product.
   
   
   

Payment confirmation emails are sent by Stripe automatically. These cannot be disabled through standard settings in either Stripe or beehiiv. If you need payment confirmation emails turned off, use our chatbot Buzz to help you reach out to beehiiv support and the team can disable them on the backend.

beehiiv does not currently send automatic renewal reminder emails before a subscriber's annual or monthly renewal. To set up renewal reminders, enable billing emails in Stripe:

1. In your Stripe dashboard, go to Settings> Billing > Subscriptions and emails.
2. Toggle on Send emails about upcoming renewals to keep subscribers informed around renewal time.
   
   
   

If you need to collect subscriber tax IDs at checkout, you can enable this in beehiiv:

1. Go to Monetize > Paid subscriptions > Paid Tiers.
2. Scroll to the Advanced options section.
3. Enable Collect subscriber tax IDs.
   
   
   

To automatically apply tax to invoices, complete the Stripe Tax onboarding process within your Stripe account.