Migrate subscriptions to Stripe Billing using toolkit

Create a sandbox in the Dashboard if you want to run a test migration first.

1. Navigate to Dashboard > Subscriptions > Migrations.

   Alternatively, you can click the overflow menu () next to + Create subscription, and select Migrate subscriptions.

2. To start your migration, click Let’s get started.

First, export your existing subscriptions by matching the exported data to a migration-compatible CSV file. You can create your own CSV file, or download any of the following CSV templates provided by Stripe:

• Basic
• Multi-price items
• Ad-hoc pricing

You can also find examples of CSV files for common migration use cases in the Toolkit CSV reference.

1. Click Download CSV template.

2. Choose a CSV template (basic, multi-price items, or ad-hoc pricing) based on your billing use case.

   Basic CSV

   This example shows a migration for common subscription use cases like quantity, taxes, billing anchor, discounts, trials, and backdating.

   Specify the following fields for a Basic CSV file:

   Multi-price items CSV

   This example shows a migration that has multiple products per subscription.

   Specify the following fields for a Multi-price items CSV file:

   Ad-hoc prices CSV

   This example shows handling a subscription migration using ad-hoc pricing for existing products.

   Specify the following fields for an Ad-hoc pricing CSV file:

3. In the CSV file, specify the details of the subscriptions you want to export.

   For Stripe-to-Stripe migrations

   If you’re migrating subscriptions within Stripe accounts, refer to the CSV example before you specify and upload a CSV file.

Click Upload CSV. The CSV file size limit is 120 MB.

Stripe validates the file to verify that the uploaded subscriptions are in the required CSV format. This process might take up to a few hours, depending on the size of the file. If the file is valid, you can proceed to the next step in the migration.

Resolve validation errors

If you have any errors in your uploaded file, the toolkit displays a failure summary. To resolve the errors:

1. Click Download file to review errors.

2. Review the processing_error column to see the errors.

3. Correct all the errors. Common errors include:

   Error	Troubleshooting
   Invalid dates	Make sure all the dates are in epoch or Unix timestamp format.
   Incorrect start_date range	Make sure the start_date for each subscription is at least 24 hours in the future.
   Missing data	Make sure every record contains the required fields.
   Incompatible price and tax	Make sure prices for specified tax rates have the same tax_behavior (inclusive versus exclusive).

4. Click Upload revised file to re-upload the corrected CSV (the CSV file size limit is 120 mb).

5. Wait for re-validation to see the latest validation status.

After Stripe validates your CSV file, review the summary of your uploaded subscriptions for any discrepancies:

1. Cross-check the summary for the correct:

   • Date of upload
   • Uploaded file name
   • Number of subscriptions
   • Number of customers
   • First subscription go-live date

2. If everything is valid, click Start migration.

   If you see errors, click Cancel migration and restart the migration from Download a CSV file.

After you review your uploaded subscriptions, track the progress of your migration:

Migration in progress

Your subscriptions are queued to schedule on the specified start date. This process can take a few minutes to a few hours, depending on the size of the file. For example, the validation and migration for 100,000 subscriptions takes approximately 30 minutes to complete.

The Billing migration toolkit uses the Subscription schedule to migrate your subscriptions. This allows your subscriptions to remain in a scheduled state for 24 hours before going live. In a sandbox, the buffer time is reduced to 1 hour for faster evaluation and testing.

Scheduled subscriptions

After migration, your subscriptions remain in a scheduled state for 24 hours before going live. You have 10 hours to cancel these scheduled subscriptions using the toolkit.

Currently, you can’t update scheduled subscriptions using the toolkit. If you want to update your scheduled subscriptions, you can either call the update endpoint, or update each subscription (one-by-one) in the Subscriptions Dashboard.

Customers can’t cancel scheduled subscriptions from their customer portal. They can only cancel live subscriptions.

Go live with subscriptions

After 24 hours, your scheduled subscriptions go live and charge customers on their applicable start dates. You can view all your live subscriptions in the Subscriptions Dashboard.

After the migration goes live, we recommend you monitor your subscriptions starting from the first payment. Make sure the charge dates and amounts for the migrated subscriptions match the specified start_date.

Customers can cancel live subscriptions from their customer portal.

Monitor subscriptions

When you monitor your subscriptions after the migration goes live, look out for problems related to payment methods.

For example, check transactions for unrecoverable issuer decline codes such as incorrect_number and take action to make sure invoices get paid. Consider notifying customers with invalid payment methods through channels other than email, such as text messages or in-app notifications.

When using automatic collection, check open or past due invoices to make sure customers aren’t missing default payment methods, which might cause the invoice to be unable to attempt collection.

To view all of your migrations:

1. Select the migration you want to review in Migrations.

2. To open a migration, click View in the dropdown menu.

   You can track the following fields:

   • Upload date
   • File name
   • Stripe billing migration id
   • Number of subscriptions
   • Migration status