Managing store credits

Credits empower you to retain customer value by offering credit for refunds, customer support resolutions, and more. Credits can be applied to customers' accounts for their next recurring subscription order.

This article explains what Credits are, how they work, and important considerations to keep in mind.

Before you start

• This feature is available through Rewards. Access to Rewards depends on your plan. Check the Loyalty tab in your merchant portal to confirm whether this feature is available in your store.

• All customer portal themes are compatible with Credits. Recharge recommends using the Affinity customer portal theme as it has more features and provides a better customer experience when using Credits.
• By default, only store owners can configure and store credits. Enable Account Permissions and assign account users that can provide customers with credits or rewards.

How it works

If you use Rewards, you can manually or automatically issue credits to your customers. Once credits are issued to a customer’s account, they can be applied to eligible upcoming recurring charges of any purchase type. Depending on the type of purchase, charges may include subscriptions and one-time products.

You can track and view the status of credits at any time in the Recharge merchant portal and use the Export Builder to export credit adjustment data for your store. For more information, see Merchant experience overview.

One-time products

Customers can apply Recharge Credits to one-time products on recurring charges if you enable the setting to allow all products to be purchased in the customer portal. This setting allows adding one-time products to recurring orders.

Recharge Credits are respected as a “special” payment method and are automatically applied towards the next recurring charge.

Due to limitations in Shopify subscription contracts, Recharge applies credits to recurring subscription orders using discount codes rather than gift cards or Shopify store credits. As a result, credits only apply to the order subtotal and cannot cover shipping or taxes.

The following logic applies to the way credit balances work on the Shopify Checkout Integration:

• If the available credit balance is less than the value of the customer’s next order, Recharge processes the difference using the payment method tied to the subscription’s address.
• If the available credit balance exceeds the value of the customer’s next order, Recharge applies credit on future orders until the available balance is used in full.

How credits are applied to orders

Recharge applies Credits differently depending on whether the customer checks out manually or is charged through a recurring subscription order.

Shopify does not currently support applying Shopify store credits or gift cards directly to recurring subscription orders. Because of this limitation, Recharge uses discount codes to apply credits to recurring charges.

Since credits are applied as discounts on recurring orders:

• Credits reduce the taxable subtotal of the order
• Credits cannot be applied toward shipping costs
• Credits cannot be applied toward taxes
• Remaining balances are charged to the customer’s saved payment method

Customer experience

Customers can view their available credit balance in all customer portal themes. The customer’s credit balance is displayed only after the credit is added to their account. Once a credit is added to a customer’s account, the credit widget remains in the customer portal regardless of the available balance.

Affinity

View credits for an upcoming charge

Customers can view their credit balance by clicking View your next order, then scrolling to the Credits section on the order page. The Credits section displays the customer’s total available balance.

View credits on the payment methods page

Customers can view their credit balance and expiration date by clicking Address & payment methods and selecting Manage payment methods. Credit balances are displayed on the payment method page after their initial credit issuance. 

Click View Credits for a detailed view of credit issuance and expiration date (if configured).  

View credits applied on previous charges

Customers can view credits applied to previous charges by clicking View previous orders and selecting a recent order. Any credits applied to a charge will be displayed in the charge summary section beneath the Total.

Merchant experience

By default, you can:

• Create Rewards programs that offer credit as an incentive
• Apply credits manually
• Adjust credit balances
• View credit history using the merchant portal and exports
• Use the Bulk Import tool in the merchant portal to add credit to multiple customer accounts in bulk.

Store owners can update additional staff accounts to manage credit balances and view credit history. For more information on enabling and updating staff permissions, see Managing Recharge user and account permissions.

Issuing credits

Reward customers for their loyalty by building a Rewards that sends customers credits at key stages of their customer journey. Use Recharge's prebuilt template Credits template to maximize the customer experience.

See How to create a subscription milestone rewards program for more details.

Configure the Rewards program for your customers

Offering Credits as a reward to customers requires you to strategically think about the overall experience, as well as the finer details, such as your settings and notifications.

Use the list below to ensure you've successfully updated every aspect of your store before you start offering credits. 

1. Update setting related to Credits
2. Adjust your email notifications and translations
3. Create the Rewards program to offer credits to customers automatically

Credits are part of Rewards. Rewards notifications are promotional communications. Customers who have opted out of marketing emails will not receive notifications related to Credits. For more information, see Viewing and editing customer communication preferences.

View credits

Credit history displays the customer’s transaction history, Credit usage, and any applied notes. You can also use the credit history page to adjust credits.

Use the following steps to view credits issued for your store in the merchant portal:

1. Click Customers in the merchant portal and select Credits from the dropdown.
   • You can also view credits from a specific customer’s profile using the Credits modal and clicking View credit history.
2. To view credit adjustment history, click a Credit ID or use the three vertical dot menu to select View history.

Credits Summary API

The Credit Summary API is available to Pro and Custom Plan merchants to allow you to build custom customer experiences using Recharge Credits. For more information, see Retrieve a customer's credit summary.

Credits performance

Use the Credits performance dashboard to identify patterns in how customers use credits, optimize when and where you offer them, and ensure your rewards program drives value for your business.

Considerations

Review the following chart for considerations when using Recharge Credits.