Canceling your subscription

You can cancel from inside Scout without emailing anyone. What stops working, and when, is worth reading before you click.

Who can cancel

Only the church owner. Billing doesn't appear on the Settings page for anyone else, and a non-owner who opens /settings/billing directly gets a card headed Read-only access that names the owner to ask. How roles work covers the rest of what ownership carries.

How to cancel

1. 1

   Open the billing page

   Click Settings at the bottom of the sidebar, or in the More sheet on a phone. Then click Billing.

2. 2

   Click Cancel subscription

   It's the second button in the Manage your subscription card, sitting under Manage billing.

3. 3

   Confirm in Stripe

   That button opens Stripe's cancel screen directly instead of the general portal, and Stripe returns you to Settings → Billing when you finish. Stripe writes the wording on its own screens, so the labels there may not match this article word for word.

Once a cancellation is scheduled, Cancel subscription disappears from the billing page. Manage billing is the way back to the subscription after that, including to undo it.

What happens after

Cancellation takes effect at the end of the period you have already paid for. Cancel on the 15th when your billing date is the 1st and you keep full access until the 1st of next month. On an annual plan you keep it until the end of the year you paid for. Cancel during the 30-day trial and access runs to the end of the trial with no charge.

Two places show you that date:

• On Settings → Billing, the date row relabels itself from Next charge to Access ends.
• A strip across the top of the dashboard reads Subscription ends with the date. For the owner it carries a Reactivate link.

Changing your mind before that date costs nothing.

When the date passes, the staff dashboard pauses. Signing in still works: people, giving, services, groups, check-in, reports, and settings redirect to a screen headed Scout is paused, reading "Your subscription has ended. Reactivate to restore access to people, giving, services, and intelligence."

churchHQ sits outside that paywall. Your congregation can keep opening the member app while the staff dashboard is paused. See What your church sees in the app.

Refunds

We don't refund the period you have already paid for, and we don't pro-rate it. Cancel an hour after a charge and that period is still yours to use. There is one exception, in Pricing & refund policy.

What happens to your data

Nothing is deleted the day you cancel. Scout holds your church's data for up to 90 days after the period ends so you can come back to it, and after 90 days we delete it. Ninety days is the longest we hold it, so take a copy of anything you need before you go.

Donation, billing, and tax records are held longer, for the period tax and accounting law requires, typically up to seven years. Backups can carry deleted data for up to another 35 days before they expire. Section 13 of the Privacy Policy has the full list.

Scout has no single button that exports your whole church. Before you cancel:

• Lists: open a list and click the download icon, labeled Export CSV, for the people on it.
• Giving: open Giving, click Open giving report, then click Export CSV.
• For anything else, email support@scout.church and tell us what you need.

Coming back

Sign in with the same email. Where you land depends on the date.

Before the period ends, your access is still full. Click Reactivate in the dashboard strip, or open Settings → Billing and click Manage billing. Stripe's portal is where the scheduled cancellation gets undone.

After the period ends, you land on Scout is paused. The owner sees a Manage billing button that opens Stripe's billing portal, plus a View billing details link. Anyone who isn't the owner sees a card reading "Billing is managed by the church owner." with the owner's name and email, and no button.

Your people, gifts, notes, and history stay in place through all of this, so there's nothing to re-import when you come back.

To change the card instead of canceling, see Updating your card. To move down a band instead, see Switching plans.