Thinkific's built-in payment processing does not support pausing a subscription natively. However, depending on which processor you are using, there are some workarounds available.
With Stripe
If you would like to remove a student's access for an extended period of time, you can do the following:
- In Thinkific, temporarily change the student's email address so that they cannot access their account (Remember to make note the original email address for future reference)
- In Stripe, locate the customer profile and apply a 100% off coupon or add a free trial period. A 100% off coupon can be applied if the student will be away for an indeterminate amount of time and removed when they return. A free trial period can be used to delay the student's next invoice to a specific date. For instructions on how to set this up in Stripe, see this Stripe help article.
- When the student returns, you can edit their email address back to what it was originally, and remove their free trial or 100% off coupon in Stripe to ensure that the subscription is being charged again.
Drip Schedule and Expiry Dates
Note that the student's enrollments will remain active in Thinkific, even though they won't be able to access their courses (since you have changed their email login.) This means that any courses that release content on a Drip Schedule, or have an expiry date or duration set, will not pause. If your courses use these settings, you may need to take additional steps to fully restore the student's subscription once their payments resume.
With Thinkific Payments
Enrollments and subscriptions are more closely linked in Thinkific Payments than if you are using Stripe. If you would like to pause student payments, or temporarily suspend a student's access to a course, please email payments-support@thinkific.com for assistance.