What failed payment recovery does for a fitness subscription
Some of the students who drop out of a subscription made no decision to leave. Their card expired, reached its limit or was reissued by the bank, and the renewal failed quietly. Without recovery that student loses access, and you lose a subscriber who was still training.
Failed payment recovery, also called dunning, catches exactly these cases: retries at sensible intervals, clear messages to the student, a fast way to update the card and a softer exit for those who need a break. In FitCoUp it is part of the retention engine and runs on every plan.
Dunning retries on day 1, 2 and 3
When a renewal is declined, the charge is tried again on day 1, day 2 and day 3 after the decline. Between the attempts the student gets a failed payment message by email, push and in-app, and a banner in your app explains what happened and how to fix it. Access closes only after the third retry fails, so a student who updates the card on day 2 keeps training without a gap.
- Three retries on day 1, 2 and 3 after a declined renewal.
- A failed payment message after each attempt, in your name, in English or Ukrainian.
- A failed payment banner in the student app until the card is fixed.
- Access stays open until the third retry fails.
- Upsell offers wait while a payment is failing.
Upcoming charge reminder and card expiry warning
Students hear about every charge before it happens. An email and a push, in your brand, go out 1 day before every renewal, whatever the plan length, and 2 days before a trial ends. The email names the program, the amount, the date and the card, with buttons to manage or cancel the plan, and the push carries the amount and the date.
An expired card is a failure you can see coming: its expiry date is known before the next charge. When the card on file expires before the charge, FitCoUp warns the student 7 days and 1 day ahead, with a link to update it. On the day the charge reminder goes out, the warning is part of that one message. The warnings stop as soon as the card changes, and the next charge goes to the new card.
- A reminder by email and push before every renewal and before a trial ends, with the amount and the date.
- 1 day before every renewal, 2 days before a trial ends.
- A card expiry warning 7 days and 1 day before the charge, never two messages on one day.
- Sent as service messages, held during the quiet hours from 22:00 to 08:00 in the student's time zone.
- Nothing goes out for a plan that is paused or set to end.
Pause instead of cancel
A failed payment is sometimes a sign that a student needs a break. When they go to cancel, the cancel flow shows a reason step and the save offers you enable.
- Pause for 30 days, with progress, streak and measurements kept.
- 50% off the next month for a student who hesitates on price.
- Switch to annual for a student who wants to commit for a year.
- Cancellation in two taps, with the reason recorded.
- Win-back at day 30 with a coupon for those who left.
The failed payment page at checkout
Recovery starts before the first subscription. When a payment at checkout does not go through, the buyer lands on the failed payment page from the template: it explains the reason in plain words, opens a new payment with the email already filled in and lists other ways to pay. Buyers who agreed to reminders also get the checkout recovery emails described on the sales funnels page.
The page comes with every plan, next to the thank you page with its one-click offer.
Stripe, plans and what you see in the dashboard
Payments run through Stripe Connect into your own Stripe account. FitCoUp never holds your money and takes 0% of your sales, so only Stripe processing applies.
Failed payment recovery is in every plan, from Basic at 99 EUR per month. The Revenue from mechanics card shows what recovery brought back next to the other mechanics, and the client economics reports show how it changes the lifetime value of a student. A playbook in the dashboard explains each step and the number to watch.