Manage Dunning

Once a dunning process is active, there are several ways to manage it. This page covers the current capabilities and planned management features.

Current Capabilities

Viewing Dunning Status

Subscriptions in dunning display the status In Dunning in the subscription list and detail views. Activity logs show all dunning events with timestamps, retry results, and failure reasons.

Automatic Recovery

If a customer makes a payment (via the self-serve payment update link or any other channel), the dunning process automatically detects the paid invoice and ends with recovery status. No manual intervention is needed.

Activity Log

All dunning actions are recorded in the activity log:

• Payment retry attempts (success/failure)
• Emails and SMS sent at each stage
• Feature restrictions applied
• Manual review escalations
• Subscription status changes
• Invoice write-offs

Each entry includes severity level (INFO, WARNING, CRITICAL), making it easy to filter and prioritize.

Planned Management Features

The following management capabilities are planned but not yet implemented. They are modeled after industry-standard dunning management features.

Pause Dunning

Status: Not Yet Implemented

Pause dunning to temporarily freeze all retries and email notifications for a specific invoice.

Planned behavior:

• Available for invoices with status “Payment Due” and Auto Collection enabled
• Requires an expected payment date as input
• Freezes retries and emails until the specified date
• Does not extend the total dunning period
• If the expected date falls within the dunning period, retries resume after that date
• If the expected date falls after the dunning period, a single final retry is made, then the final action executes

Use cases:

• Customer promises to pay on a specific date
• Customer is on vacation and will update payment method upon return
• Waiting for a wire transfer to clear

Resume Dunning

Status: Not Yet Implemented

Resume a previously paused dunning process.

Planned behavior:

• Restarts the remaining retries from where they were paused
• Skips any retries that were scheduled during the pause period
• Resumes the email notification sequence

Stop Dunning

Status: Not Yet Implemented

Permanently stop a dunning process. Once stopped, it cannot be restarted.

Planned behavior:

• Halts all retries and notifications immediately
• Invoice marked as “Not Paid”
• Optionally captures an expected payment date for reference
• Subscription remains in its current status (not automatically cancelled)
• Use when the customer has arranged alternative payment outside of BillHive

Collect Now (Manual Retry)

Status: Not Yet Implemented

Manually trigger a payment collection attempt from the invoice detail page or subscription detail page.

Planned behavior:

• Available for invoices in dunning status
• Triggers an immediate payment retry using the current payment method
• Counts toward the dunning retry attempts when Smart Dunning is enabled
• Results logged in the dunning retry attempts section
• If successful, dunning process ends and subscription is restored

Expected Payment Date

Status: Not Yet Implemented

Capture and track when a customer is expected to make a payment.

Planned behavior:

• Set when pausing or stopping dunning
• Displayed in the invoice detail view
• Used for internal tracking and follow-up reminders
• Does not trigger any automatic actions

Dunning API Endpoints

The following API endpoints are planned:

Related Topics

• How Dunning Works — Step-by-step dunning flow
• Pending Features — Full list of planned enhancements
• Write-Off — Writing off uncollectible invoices