Subscription Billing for New Patrons
Patreon has finally gotten their stuff together, offering billing from the point you join rather than the first of the month.
New patrons will now be on a monthly billing cycle from the day they join.
Current patrons will not be affected by this.
The problem was that a lot of people get paid towards the end of the month, subscribe, and then get billed again a few days later. Say, for instance, you got paid and subscribed on September 30, 2022...you'd then got billed again the very next day on October 1, 2022.
More often than not a new patron will see this second bill, think that they've been wrongfully double charged, and then say "the heck with you". Roughly 60% of new patrons cancel in the first week of their membership because of this.
Personally, I am not a "starving artist" and don't rely on Patreon as my sole source of income. Artists that do rely on Patreon for income, however, the money they lose from the "heck with you's" can be, well...having to decide between paying the rent or the power bill and then eating ramen noodles every night ain't real fun.
Current patrons who wish to switch to subscription billing will have to cancel their membership and sign up again after their original access has ended.
Comments (2)
I really wish that the choice of billing date were up to the subscriber tbh. I understand the issues with 1st-of-the-month billing, but I personally much prefer having one bill per month rather than a bunch of smaller ones scattered throughout. So much easier to keep track of how much I'm spending that way. So now whenever I subscribe to someone new, I need to set a reminder for myself and wait until the first day of the next month to subscribe.
Actually, when you sub to someone new they may still have the old 1st of the month thing. They have to opt in to the new way. I honestly wish they'd give the patrons the option of sub billing or 1st of the month, but....yeah, that's Patreon for you.