Non prorated calendar billing for stripe subscriptions?

Question

Using the checkout via the stripe-php SDK I have a standard annual membership for my site that costs $100 per year. If I sign up 26 March 2024, it will auto renew on 26 March 2025 as expected.

I am required to change the billing schedule to calendar year so 1 Jan to 31 Dec.

I am aware that I can set the billing_cycle_anchor to 31 Jan 2025. However, this introduces proration_behavior which is either always or none.

Always - prorates, so if I sign up 26 March, it will charge me $77 and invoice me at the full rate on 31 January 2025. None - price is $0 today and don't have to pay until 31 Jan 2025, so almost a whole year of inadvertent free membership.

$nextYear = date('Y') + 1;
$checkout_params = [
  'line_items' => [
    [
      'price' => $prices->data[0]->id,
      'quantity' => 1,
    ],
   ],
   'mode' => 'subscription',
   'success_url' => $success_url . '?success=true&session_id={CHECKOUT_SESSION_ID}',
   'cancel_url' => $return_url,
   'customer_email' => $email,
   'subscription_data' => [
     'billing_cycle_anchor' => strtotime("{$nextYear}-01-01"),
     'proration_behaviour' => 'none',
   ]
];

$checkout_session = \Stripe\Checkout\Session::create($checkout_params);

Desired Outcome

I do not wish to prorate, if someone signs up today (26 March) I want them to be billed $100 (the full cost of the annual subscription). Then again on the billing period. Is this possible in Stripe?

Answer 1

You can use payment mode checkout session to charge your customer for an ad-hoc $100 membership (remember to set setup_future_usage to save the payment method used in this payment), and create a subscription schedule to start the subscription on 1 Jan next year.

Answer 2

I found a way to do this with just the one Checkout Session call.

• Use subscription_data.trial_end instead of billing_cycle_anchor
• Remove proration_behavior
• Add a one-time Price to your line_items, which has the same amount as your recurring one.

Result = the Session will bill for the one-time Price today, and will bill for the recurring Price on the trial_end date, no prorations.

$checkout_params = [
 'line_items' => [
  [
   'price' => $prices->data[0]->id,
   'quantity' => 1,
  ],
  [
   'price' => $one-time-price,
   'quantity' => 1,
  ],
 ],
 'mode' => 'subscription',
 'success_url' => $success_url . '?success=true&session_id={CHECKOUT_SESSION_ID}',
 'cancel_url' => $return_url,
 'customer_email' => $email,
 'subscription_data' => [
  'trial_end' => strtotime("{$nextYear}-01-01"),
 ]
];