Membership Expiration Dates

Elizabeth Diephouse

Jan 10, 2024

3381

Expiration dates are set when a membership is created. The Membership Start Date plus Membership Term length = Membership Expiration Date.

Example:

Membership Start Date = 3/14/2020

Membership Term length = 12 months

Membership Expiration Date = 3/13/2021

NOTE: If the Membership Type has “Renew Everyone in X Month” enabled, then the expiration date will be set to the day before that month. e.g. If “Renew Everyone in January” is selected, the expiration date will default to 12/31 of the current year. If July, then 6/30 will be the expiration date.

After being set the first time, expiration dates are automatically updated by the system and can be adjusted by back-office staff.

Automatic update occurs:

When a payment or credit (full or partial) is applied/made on an invoice that is tied to a membership.

Details: When the payment is made on an open invoice associated with an Upgrade, Downgrade, Adjust, or Renewal activity item, the expiration date of that activity item becomes the Expiration date of the Membership. Once the payment or credit is applied, allow 1-2 minutes for the expiration date to update to the new date.

To see if an invoice is associated with a membership, click on the membership in the Membership section when on the contact’s profile tab. If associated, the Membership Activity item would show a linked Invoice # in the column of that activity item.

New and Reactivate activations are currently being set at the next year (i.e. full term length) expiration date immediately – whether or not they are paid. You can manually change the expiration back to an earlier date if you wish, allowing the payment of that item to update the expiration date. See Managing Expiration Dates below
Imported invoices are not often tied to a membership, so payments made against those cannot automatically update the expiration date. A manual update of the expiration date for these would be required. Then the next invoice generated for this membership will automatically update.

Example:

My membership is a 12-month long membership and renews on January 1st every year.
I signed up for my membership in January 2023 and paid my invoice when signing up, so I am currently up to date on dues.
My Expiration date and Future Expiration Date are both 12/31/23.
In November 2023 you are creating renewal invoices for memberships with the Next Bill Date of Jan 1, 2024. This lets me know in advance I have dues to pay.
When the membership renewal invoice is created, my Expiration Date stays 12/31/23, BUT my future expiration date is now set to 12/31/24 because an invoice was created for dues via the system running billing (this is important in that a standalone invoice was created for dues manually would not do this).
If I pay my membership invoice, the system changes my Expiration date to 12/31/24, and now both dates (Expiration Date and Future Expiration Date) match.
If I do not pay my membership invoice, my Expiration date stays set to 12/31/23, and depending on your system setup:
- My membership may be dropped
- My membership may show up on membership reports as Expired, which lets your staff know they should manually drop my membership or try to reach out and have me pay my dues.
- If you have auto-drop turned on, the system will auto-drop me once my expiration date + grace period (if applicable) is over.