1. Introduction
A subscription is an active agreement between a customer and a business where the customer pays on a recurring basis to access a product or service defined by a plan. For example, if a customer signs up for the “Pro Plan” at $29/month on January 1st, that ongoing billing and customer relationship is their subscription.
With Monta, you can create different kind of plans and apply subscriptions to get active agreements with your customers that allow you to generate monthly recurring revenue.
2. Apply a Subscription
Applying and approving Subscription plans can only be performed by Operator level users with Admin or Manager level rights.
2.1 Apply a Charge point subscription plan
If you set up a charge point plan, then you need to apply it on each charge point individually.
- Open the Charge points view in Monta Hub and find the specific charge point, then click on quick actions (…). You can also access this from the charge point page, in the Subscriptions tab
- Click on Apply subscription
- Select the subscription(s) and click Continue
- Confirm the application by selecting Apply
- If you have set the plan to automatically approve new subscriptions, it will show as “Active”
- If you need to manually approve the subscription, continue to the next step
2.2 Apply a Team subscription plan
If you set up Team subscription plan, then you need to apply it on a Team. This type of plan allows you to apply the subscription on all charge points within a Team at once.
- Find the Team in Monta Hub and click on the quick actions (…). You can also access this from the Team page, in the Settings tab
- Click on Apply Subscription (or Add Subscription in Settings)
- Select the plan(s) from the drop-down menu and click on Apply Subscription
- If you have set the plan to automatically approve new subscriptions, it will show as Active
- If you need to manually approve the subscription, continue to next step
3. Approve a subscription plan
Applying and approving Subscription plans can only be performed by Operator level users with Admin or Manager level rights.
3.1 Approve Charge point subscription plan
- Find the charge point and hover over the Charge point subscription link
- Click on the summary of the Pending subscription to open it
- Click on Approve
- You can select a custom date, First Purchase Date – when you want the client to be charged for the first time
- You can also upload the contract with the client
- Click on Approve subscription
- The subscription is now active!
- The client will be charged from the Team Wallet every month on the purchase date.
3.2 Approve Team subscription plan
- Find the Team and hover over the Team subscription link
- Click on the summary of the Pending subscription to open it
- Click on Approve
- You can select a custom date, First Purchase Date – when you want the client to be charged for the first time
- You can also upload the contract with the client
- Click on Approve subscription
- The subscription is now active!
- Monthly plan price will be charged from the Team Wallet every month on the purchase date.
- The client will be charged number of charge points in Team X monthly plan price
3.3 First Purchase Date
When approving a subscription, you can choose the First Purchase Date to ensure that customers are only charged for the portion of the month they actually use. This date could reflect the start date in your sales contract, the installation date of the charge point, or any other relevant milestone.
- Once a subscription is approved, its status becomes Active, even if the First Purchase Date is in the future.
- You can view both the Approval Date and the Next Purchase Date in the subscription details.
The First Purchase Date marks the beginning of billing and is when pro-rata charges are calculated. After that, regular billing recurs monthly.
Note: For both advance and arrears payment methods, this date determines the actual payment date.
4. Next Steps
As you as an operator apply more and more subscriptions, you may need to individualise some subscriptions or cancel others. To learn how, see the article Manage Plans & Subscriptions for general options, and Create and Manage Tax Refunds for tax refund-specific options.