Managing a customer's subscription on their behalf

Customers often email you to pause, cancel, skip an order, change frequency, swap a product, or update their address or card. You can do all of this for them from your Shopify admin, without waiting for them to use the customer portal and without needing their approval. This guide shows how, and which emails the customer receives.

Table of contents

• Find the customer's subscription
• Pause, cancel, or reactivate
• Skip or reschedule an upcoming order
• Change frequency, products, or discount
• Update the shipping address
• Update the payment method
• Will the customer be notified?
• Bulk actions and the emails they send
• Reactivate many paused subscriptions on a set date
• Cancel all subscriptions (closing your store)
• Changes customers make themselves
• Common questions
• Related guides

Find the customer's subscription

Open Supr Bundles & Subscriptions > Subscriptions, search by customer name, email, phone or subscription number, then click the subscription to open it. The Customer card on its page shows how many subscriptions that customer has; click the number to list them all. The order card shows the next order as Shopify calculates it, shipping and estimated tax included, and refreshes it when it is more than a day old.

Pause, cancel, or reactivate

The buttons are at the bottom of the order card near the top of the page (under the products and totals):

• Pause subscription: stops renewals and billing without ending the subscription. You or the customer can resume it later.
• Cancel subscription: ends the subscription permanently. The customer won't be billed again and no new orders are created. A cancelled subscription cannot be reactivated.
• Activate subscription: resumes a paused subscription, or restarts a failed one.

Active subscriptions show Pause subscription and Cancel subscription. Paused ones show Activate subscription and Cancel subscription. Failed ones show Pause subscription and Activate subscription; to cancel a failed subscription, pause it first or use the bulk cancel action.

A few behaviours worth knowing:

• Resuming a paused subscription: if you activate it before its next billing date, the customer is billed on that date as normal (no extra order). If the date has already passed, they are billed within the hour. To choose a different date, use Edit schedule first (see below).
• Restarting a failed subscription: fix the cause first, usually the card (see Update the payment method), then click Activate subscription.
• Deleted products stay on a subscription: if you delete a product or variant in Shopify, it remains on existing subscriptions until you edit the subscription and replace it.
• Orders can't be moved between subscriptions: if a customer bought a second subscription by mistake, cancel the extra one (and refund its order in Shopify if needed) and keep the original.

Skip or reschedule an upcoming order

In the Upcoming renewals card, click Edit schedule:

• Set specific date: pick the new date (and optionally the time) for the next renewal.
• Shift by relative amount: choose Move forward or Move backward, an Amount, and a Unit (Days, Weeks, Months or Renewal cycles).

Click Update schedule. All later renewals follow the new date.

There is no separate Skip button for merchants. To skip one order, choose Shift by relative amount, Move forward, 1, Renewal cycles. The next order then happens one full cycle later.

Untick Send a notification to the customer if you don't want the Next billing date changed email to go out. Full details, including letting customers reschedule or skip themselves: Changing the next billing or charge date.

Change frequency, products, or discount

Click Edit (top right of the subscription page; bottom center on mobile) to change:

• The frequency, or the subscription option the subscription follows.
• Products, variants, quantities, prices, and per-product discounts.
• The recurring subscription discount and discount codes.
• The shipping rate and cost.
• Duration limits (minimum and maximum number of renewals).
• Billing mode: pay per order or prepaid.

Review everything in the Summary card, then click Update contract. Changing the frequency does not move the next billing date; use Edit schedule for that. The totals are Shopify's own calculation of the next order, shipping and estimated tax included. If Shopify spots a problem, such as a product that no longer exists or an address none of your locations ships to, a warning appears at the top of the page; it never stops you saving. Full walkthrough: Editing a Subscription Contract.

Update the shipping address

In the Customer card, click the pencil icon next to Shipping address. Future orders ship to the new address.

The customer changing the address in their store account profile does not update a subscription: Shopify keeps the two separate. Either you change it here, or the customer changes it on the subscription in the portal (if Update shipping address is turned on in Settings > Customer portal).

Update the payment method

Nobody can type card details into the admin: cards are stored by Shopify and your payment provider. You can still sort it out from the Payment method card on the subscription page:

• Change payment method switches the subscription to another card the customer has already saved in your store (offered when they have more than one).
• Send payment update email sends the customer a secure Shopify link to add a new card. Once they finish, future renewals use it.

The customer changing their card in their store account or Shop Pay wallet does not update the subscription. Step by step: How to update a subscription payment method.

Will the customer be notified?

Yes. Customers are emailed automatically about changes you make, unless you turn that email off under Settings > Notifications > Customer notifications. To make a change quietly, switch the email off before the change and back on afterwards.

Every change is also recorded in the subscription's Timeline, showing whether you or the customer made it.

Bulk actions and the emails they send

To change many subscriptions at once, filter the Subscriptions list (for example Status is Paused), tick the subscriptions, or tick the top box and click Select all in store to include every subscription matching your filters and search. Then pick a bulk action. Large batches can take up to 5 minutes or more to finish. Try a new action on 2 or 3 subscriptions first.

Add product, Swap product, Remove product, Change subscription, Update shipping price and Sync prices show their impact before anything changes. Shopify calculates each selected subscription's next order before and after the change, and you see the totals, plus any subscription Shopify would refuse or warn about (for example an address none of your locations ships to), with a Leave these out checkbox. Nothing changes until you confirm, and the change then runs on exactly the subscriptions in the preview. A large selection takes a while to calculate, about a dozen subscriptions every few seconds.

The checkbox in each dialog is Send a notification to the customer. The emails themselves are edited under Settings > Notifications. For changing prices on existing subscribers, see Changing prices for existing subscribers.

Reactivate many paused subscriptions on a set date

1. Filter the Subscriptions list by Status Paused and select them (use Select all in store for every match).
2. Run Reschedule first and set the date you want them to restart billing on.
3. Then run Change status > Activate subscription. They are billed on the date you set.

If you activate first, any subscription whose billing date has already passed is charged within the hour.

Cancel all subscriptions (closing your store)

1. On the Subscriptions list, tick the top box and click Select all in store. (Filtering by status is optional: the cancel action only changes active, paused and failed subscriptions.)
2. Choose Change status > Cancel subscription.
3. Untick Send a notification to the customer if you don't want to email everyone, then confirm.

Cancelling cannot be undone. If you are uninstalling the app afterwards, see What happens when you uninstall the app.

Changes customers make themselves

You are not emailed when a customer edits a subscription in the portal (for example removes a product or changes the frequency). Every change they make is listed in the subscription's Timeline, marked as made by the customer. You can turn on staff emails for new, paused and cancelled subscriptions under Settings > Notifications > Staff notifications.

If a customer removes items and the shipping price should change too, turn on When a customer updates their subscription through the customer portal under Settings > Shipping > Automatic shipping price updates, or edit the shipping on the subscription yourself. To stop customers removing products at all, turn off Remove products in Settings > Customer portal.

Common questions

A customer asked me to change their frequency. Can I do it on my end?
Yes. Open the subscription, click Edit, change it in the Subscription card and click Update contract. Then check the next billing date in Upcoming renewals, because editing does not move it.

Can I skip a customer's next order without pausing?
Yes: Edit schedule > Shift by relative amount > Move forward > 1 > Renewal cycles.

A customer cancelled. Can I reactivate their subscription?
No, cancelling is permanent. They can subscribe again, you can send them a quick subscribe link, or you can create a new contract for them if they have a saved payment method.

Can I move a subscription to another customer or email address?
No. A subscription stays with the Shopify customer who bought it, and Shopify does not merge customer records that have subscriptions. You can keep managing it for them here, change the email on their original customer record in Shopify (if the new email isn't used by another customer), or create a new contract for the other customer and cancel this one.

How do I merge two subscriptions of the same customer?
If they share the same frequency, address and payment method, open the one to keep, click Edit, add the other subscription's products, click Update contract, then cancel the other subscription.

The customer updated their card or address in their account, but the renewal used the old one. Why?
Account and Shop Pay details do not flow into subscriptions. Update the address on the subscription, and send a payment update email for the card.

Related guides

• A Beginner's Guide to Subscription Contracts
• Editing a Subscription Contract
• Changing the next billing or charge date
• How to update a subscription payment method
• Customer Portal Settings
• Notifications

Updated on: 10/03/2026