🩵 You can activate Automated Membership Cancellation in the Apps tab!
When this feature is turned on, Amilia SmartRec automatically schedules a cancellation for any membership on recurring billing if the most recent invoice item is unpaid or partially paid, so you don't have to track down and manually cancel unpaid ongoing memberships one by one. It also helps prevent future unpaid recurring invoices.
Memberships on recurring billing that are automatically scheduled for cancellation due to an unpaid balance are easy to spot in Membership management.
How it works & limitations
How to turn it on
The app must be activated in the Apps tab.
To give admins the ability to turn this feature on or off, the account owner must add this permission to one or more permission groups.
🔑 Permission name | What it does |
Payments | Required to turn on and off the automated membership termination tool. |
You can turn this feature on in Accounting and finance > Payments > Payment recovery. Add a checkmark in the box and click Save.
After it's turned on
A 'Status details' column becomes available in Membership management.
Any membership on recurring billing with a balance on its latest invoice is automatically scheduled for cancellation. Its status changes from Active to Upcoming cancellation, and Unpaid balance shows in the Status details column.
Only the membership's own latest invoice item counts toward this balance, not unrelated charges elsewhere on the account. The one exception is the account's overall expected balance: if it's $0.00 or less, the cancellation is skipped, even if no payment is reconciled to the latest recurring invoice item. More info here.
Moving forward, any membership invoice item left with an unpaid or partially paid balance once the recurring invoice is generated on the Billing day automatically switches to the Upcoming cancellation status (Unpaid balance), and can be used up until the Last date of service (inclusively) It stops being eligible for use on the next Billing date, unless the balance is rectified beforehand, in which case the Upcoming cancellation status is automatically removed and the membership remains active. More info here.
If you turn it off afterwards
If you turn this feature off, it only stops future automatic cancellations and hides the Upcoming cancellation (Unpaid balance) status details in Membership management, even historically. These status details also disappear from the Members list report. If you turn it back on, all the results will return, but only takes into consideration invoice items for memberships on recurring billing that are currently unpaid or partially paid.
It does not collect any outstanding balances, or bring back memberships that were already cancelled.
Limitations ⚠️
❗ Consider these before relying on automated membership termination ❗
Only memberships on recurring billing can benefit from this feature. Memberships with fixed dates or duration are exempt.
It doesn't resolve unpaid invoices. It prevents additional unpaid invoices from happening.
This feature depends on payments being reconciled to the invoice item for the membership on recurring billing invoice. Be cautious with any manual reconciliation changes, as they can affect whether a balance is correctly detected as unpaid.
If you override the automatic cancellation and the new invoice item generated on the next billing day has an unpaid or partially paid balance, the membership is flagged with the Upcoming cancellation status again. Only that new invoice item is considered, not any balance remaining on the previous one. See here for more info.
Invoice items linked to split billing are excluded from this feature and are never cancelled automatically.
1. How is an unpaid membership balance detected?
Every invoice item generated for a membership's recurring billing carries a link to the billing option in the backend, so Amilia SmartRec only considers charges tied to that membership's billing cycle, nothing unrelated elsewhere on the account. It checks the membership's latest invoice item only, comparing whether it's reconciled to a payment against the account's expected balance.
If a membership has more than one unpaid billing period behind it, only the most recently generated invoice item is checked. Paying or covering that latest invoice item is what determines the outcome, not the full history of what's owed.
Invoice item status | Balance on the account | Result |
Unreconciled | Balance remains on the account. | Flagged: Unpaid balance |
Partially reconciled | Balance remains after a partial payment. | Flagged: Unpaid balance |
Fully reconciled | Unrelated balance elsewhere on the account. | Not flagged: The invoice item is fully reconciled to a payment. |
Fully reconciled | Balance remains, but Expected balance is $0.00 | Not flagged: The invoice item is fully reconciled to a payment. |
Unreconciled | Balance remains, but Expected balance is $0.00 | Not flagged: A planned payment will clear the balance on the account, so it's understood that the invoice item will be paid, regardless of reconciliations. |
2. Find upcoming cancellations for an unpaid balance
Permission name 🔑 | What it does |
Memberships | Required to view Membership management. |
Memberships | Optional if you want the ability to use the Actions column. |
The Upcoming cancellation status indicates that:
The latest invoice item for a membership on recurring billing is unpaid or partially paid, and no payment or installment brings the account's expected balance down to $0. You'll see Unpaid balance in the Status details column.
If the cancellation was planned by an admin or a member, you'll instead see Planned cancellation in the Status details column.
With filters, you can search by Status (but not by Status details) and view up to 100 results at a time. Otherwise, you can export the full Membership management table to Excel and filter from there.
💡 The 'Next billing date' column helps you catch the next upcoming cancellations.
2.1 How to view upcoming cancellation details
To view upcoming cancellation details, click Actions, and then Cancel.
When an ongoing membership has an 'Unpaid balance', the upcoming cancellation form is locked and can't be edited (unless you delete the cancellation and manually schedule a new cancellation):
Last date of service is the day before the next billing date.
Reason for cancellation is pre-filled with Terminated by organization.
Comments is pre-filled with Automatic cancellation due to non-payment.
2.2 How to view completed cancellations for unpaid balances
Permission name 🔑 | What it does |
Memberships | Required to view the Members list report in the Reports tab. |
To see memberships on recurring billing that were already cancelled due to an unpaid balance, use the Members List report. Here's how:
Go the Reports tab and search for the Members list.
Filter by status Cancelled.
Add the Cancellation reason and Cancellation comments columns.
Look for Terminated by organization as the reason, with Automatic cancellation due to non-payment as the comment, to isolate the ones cancelled by this feature specifically.
💡 You can save these columns and filters as a template,
so this information is one click away every time you need it.
3. How to override cancellation for an unpaid balance
Permission name 🔑 | What it does |
Memberships | Required to view Membership management. |
Memberships | Required to use Cancel in the Actions column. |
If you want to keep the member's membership active (regardless of a balance) or need to change the last date of service because a payment can't be made in time, you need to Delete the cancellation in Membership management.
To delete a cancellation, click Actions, then Cancel and Delete cancellation.
A success message confirms the upcoming cancellation is deleted.
The membership's status returns to Active and the Status details disappear, but the balance still remains in the member's account.
If the balance on the next invoice item is unpaid or partially paid on the next billing day, the membership will be flagged with the Upcoming cancellation status again, and these steps will need to be repeated.
FAQ
8. Can the grace period for an automated scheduled cancellation be customized (e.g., 60 or 90 days)?
What counts as a balance that will trigger a scheduled cancellation?
This feature looks at the latest invoice item generated for the membership on recurring billing. Every invoice item generated for a membership's recurring billing is linked back to its billing option, so only charges actually tied to that membership's billing cycle are compared against what's been reconciled or planned as installments. A balance from an invoice item unrelated to the membership does not directly trigger a cancellation.
The one exception is the account's overall expected balance, which is used as a safety net: if that sits at $0.00 or less, Amilia SmartRec treats the invoice item as covered and skips the cancellation. So an unrelated balance can't cause a cancellation.
On the next Billing day, the feature looks to see if the new invoice item is paid, and no longer considers any previous invoice item for that membership.
Does having no payment method on file cause a membership to be cancelled?
No. Whether a payment method is on file has no bearing on this. What matters is whether the membership's latest invoice item is unpaid or partially paid, and if so, the membership is flagged for cancellation, whether or not a payment method is attached. If it's fully reconciled, or the account's expected balance is $0.00, the membership isn't scheduled for cancellation, even without a payment method on file.
What happens to a planned cancellation if the membership also gets an unpaid balance?
If a membership already has a planned cancellation (by the admin or member) and then becomes flagged with an unpaid balance before that planned date, the cancellation moves up to the end of the current service period and the reason/comment are overwritten with Terminated by organization and Automatic cancellation due to non-payment.
If the balance on the invoice item is paid in full (or covered by upcoming installments) before that happens, the original planned cancellation and its original reason/comment return.
Are memberships on split billing affected by this feature?
No. Invoices linked to split billing are excluded from automated membership termination and won't be scheduled for cancellation through this feature.
What if the balance on the membership invoice item isn't paid before the next billing day after I use Delete cancellation?
This feature only looks at the latest invoice item generated for the membership. This means that if the next recurring invoice item is left unpaid or partially unpaid on the Billing day, the membership will again be flagged with the Upcoming cancellation status (unpaid balance), and you'll need to repeat the steps to delete the cancellation if you want to keep the membership active.
The previous invoice item is no longer looked at once a new one is generated, even if a balance still remains on it. Only the latest invoice item determines whether the membership gets flagged.
Does deleting the cancellation waive the amount owed?
No. Using Delete cancellation only cancels the automated scheduled cancellation. The unpaid balance remains on the account until it's paid, credited, or otherwise resolved.
How does a membership return to Active if it had an unpaid balance?
A membership is reinstated to Active in one of two ways"
Before the next billing date:
The membership invoice item is fully paid.
The membership invoice item is scheduled to be fully paid through upcoming payments (for example, installments).
The account's expected balance is $0.00. or less
At any time, regardless of the balance:
Delete cancellation is used to override the cancellation while keeping the balance owed.
Can the grace period for an automated scheduled cancellation be customized (e.g., 60 or 90 days)?
No, not currently. This functionality always schedules the cancellation for the day before the next billing date, this isn't configurable to a longer grace period.
If you need more time before a specific membership is cancelled, you can use Delete cancellation to skip that cancellation, but this is a manual step and needs to be repeated for each billing cycle you want to extend.
* Last updated in September 2026