How to maintain steady cash flow during the COVID-19 crisis using Zoho Subscriptions

How to maintain steady cash flow during the COVID-19 crisis using Zoho Subscriptions

Dear customers,

I hope this finds you and your loved ones in good health.

We're all witnessing the effect that COVID-19 is having on businesses throughout the world. As consumers try to conserve their own resources, businesses can expect to receive more cancellation requests than usual. 

Here are some useful tips to help you be flexible and keep your customer base:

1. Communicate candidly and clearly with your customers:
During this period, transparent communication with customers is a necessity. A lot of businesses have started displaying messages on their home pages, explaining their BCP (Business Continuity Process) and other important announcements they want to convey to their customers.

As an additional means of communication, you can use the banner message in the customer portal of Zoho Subscriptions. The banner message is visible in the home page of the portal, so it can help get the customer's attention quickly. You can set up this message under Settings > Preferences > Branding > Portal settings.

2. Put renewals on a temporary hold:
      i) Pause and resume subscriptions
It's a good idea to provide your customers the option to freeze their subscriptions temporarily, rather than canceling them altogether. By giving them an option to pause their subscriptions, you are letting your customers know that they can rely on you when it's time to resume. It's also a good way to encourage customers to stick with you for their next purchase instead of switching vendors. 

Here's how you can pause a subscription in Zoho Subscriptions:



You can still perform automatic actions while a subscription is paused, through Zapier.

      ii) Extend the billing date:
Even customers who love your service may have difficulty paying for it on time right now. One way to keep these customers from canceling is to push back the date for their next subscription payment. By offering uninterrupted service and a little more time to pay, you're giving them a good reason to remain loyal. To do this, just update the subscription's Next Billing Date in Zoho Subscriptions and they won't be charged until the new date.



3. Be approachable:
As a standard business practice, you might have set up automatic payment reminders in Zoho Subscriptions to go out on specific days before or after the invoice due date. However, given the current circumstances, you can definitely expect delays in payment.

Since you have control over the content that goes out in these reminder emails, think about rephrasing it to let your customers know that if they need any assistance, they can reach out to you by phone or email. This way, your finance team doesn't have to wait and wonder whether the customer will make their payment or not, or spend time sending extra emails. You can tweak your reminder email content under Settings > Reminders.

By making it easy for your customers to approach you and treating them on a case-by-case basis, you can actually bring down the number of unpaid transactions.

4. Offer credits:
Another way to earn the customer's goodwill is to create special offers to assist them. For instance, Zoho's Emergency Subscription Assistance Program (ESAP) offers subscription credits to businesses in need. If you want to adopt a similar practice for your business, you can create credit notes in Zoho Subscriptions and enable the Redeem Credit Notes option so that it is automatically applied for the upcoming renewal.

5. Don't auto-cancel services upon non-payment:
Most subscription businesses have automated their billing process in such a way that if the customer doesn't pay, the subscription is automatically canceled. While this is a good practice most of the time, you might want to adopt a flexible approach during this crisis. 

Instead of letting the subscriptions be canceled automatically, you can monitor the Under Risk report in Zoho Subscriptions, and contact those customers to suggest alternate payment arrangements for your services.

6. Know why your customers leave:
During difficult times, businesses and customers alike aim to cut costs and reduce their spending.  If your customers are canceling right now, make sure you give them a chance to say why they're leaving. You might be able to retain them by offering some flexibility, or it may be best to reach out to them later and see if they're ready to come back. Even if you can't keep them as a customer, knowing why they left still helps you improve your service going forward. 

In Zoho Subscriptions, you have the option to make the Cancelation Reason field mandatory. You can configure this under Settings > Preferences > Subscription > Cancellation Preferences.



Though some of these tips might have a negative effect on your finances temporarily, they can gain you long-term benefits like customer loyalty and customer retention, which will help your business recover more easily. 

Did you find these tips useful? Can you think of some other best practices that businesses can use to get through difficult times? Let us know in the comments. 

Note from Zoho: If you need any assistance regarding Zoho Subscriptions, our support team is available 24 hours a day, Monday-Friday. You can also reach out to us through email (support@zohosubscriptions.com) or phone.

Because Zoho recognizes that our own customers may be facing difficult times right now, we have rolled out an Emergency Subscription Assistance Program (ESAP) to help small businesses through this crisis. Learn more about this program.

Take care and stay safe! We'll get through this storm together.

Regards,
Harikrishna
Customer Relations | Zoho Finance



    Access your files securely from anywhere







                            Zoho Developer Community





                                                  Use cases

                                                  Make the most of Zoho Desk with the use cases.

                                                   
                                                    

                                                  eBooks

                                                  Download free eBooks and access a range of topics to get deeper insight on successfully using Zoho Desk.

                                                   
                                                    

                                                  Videos

                                                  Watch comprehensive videos on features and other important topics that will help you master Zoho Desk.

                                                   
                                                    

                                                  Webinar

                                                  Sign up for our webinars and learn the Zoho Desk basics, from customization to automation and more

                                                   
                                                    
                                                  • Desk Community Learning Series


                                                  • Meetups


                                                  • Ask the Experts


                                                  • Kbase


                                                  • Resources


                                                  • Glossary


                                                  • Desk Marketplace


                                                  • MVP Corner




                                                            • Sticky Posts

                                                            • Introducing Invoice Consolidation for Offline Subscriptions

                                                              Hello Folks, Glad to announce the feature of Invoice Consolidation for Offline Subscriptions. If you are having multiple subscriptions for your customers, now, you can send a single consolidated invoice for all the Offline Subscriptions that are getting renewed on the same date. Advantage?  Customers will be receiving single invoice instead of multiple invoices upon renewal. Also reduces your efforts in follow-up with your customers for payment collections. For Example: If Customer has Subscription
                                                            • New feature: Create back-dated subscriptions

                                                              Hello from the Zoho Subscriptions team. :)   We’re happy to announce that today marks the launch of a much-awaited feature: creating back-dated subscriptions!   From here on out, whenever you create a new subscription with an activation date that is earlier than the present date, you’ll no longer get an error. Instead, you'll be creating a back-dated subscription. This means that the subscription started at that earlier point in time. The next billing date will be calculated automatically based on
                                                            • Announcement Regarding Notification Emails

                                                              Hello Everyone! This announcement is regarding the admin notification emails which you've been receiving from the email address "support@zohosubscriptions.com". From the 1st of October, 06:00 GMT, the emails with the following subjects will be sent from "no-reply@zohosubscriptions.com". Unable to send invoice for the profile - {profile_name} Unable to process auto payments. If you have set up any filters or workflow in your email account, please add "no-reply@zohosubscriptions.com” and  “support@zohosubscriptions.com”
                                                            • Zoho Subscriptions plugin for WordPress

                                                              Zoho Subscriptions plugin for WordPress allows you to easily embed your plan specific checkout page in an iframe with just a few mouse clicks and without a single line of code. How can WordPress Zoho Subscriptions Plugin boost your productivity? It's now easier to embed Zoho Subscriptions checkout page in your WordPress site. Forget the old method of logging in to Zoho Subscriptions, copying a URL and scripting to make adjustments. All this can be done automatically through this plugin. A great time
                                                            • Indian GST organisation Migration Guide

                                                              With respect to the new GST regime releasing on July 1, 2017in India, Zoho Subscriptions Indian edition is also gearing up to make your business GST Ready. This article focuses on how to get your existing organisation in Zoho Subscriptions to migrate to the new GST regime.    Note:  Any organisation created on or after July 1, 2017 will already be GST ready. You wouldn't have to migrate your organisation. Migrating your existing organisation to support GST To migrate your existing organisation to


                                                            Manage your brands on social media



                                                                  Zoho TeamInbox Resources



                                                                      Zoho CRM Plus Resources

                                                                        Zoho Books Resources


                                                                          Zoho Subscriptions Resources

                                                                            Zoho Projects Resources


                                                                              Zoho Sprints Resources


                                                                                Qntrl Resources


                                                                                  Zoho Creator Resources



                                                                                      Zoho CRM Resources

                                                                                      • CRM Community Learning Series

                                                                                        CRM Community Learning Series


                                                                                      • Kaizen

                                                                                        Kaizen

                                                                                      • Functions

                                                                                        Functions

                                                                                      • Meetups

                                                                                        Meetups

                                                                                      • Kbase

                                                                                        Kbase

                                                                                      • Resources

                                                                                        Resources

                                                                                      • Digest

                                                                                        Digest

                                                                                      • CRM Marketplace

                                                                                        CRM Marketplace

                                                                                      • MVP Corner

                                                                                        MVP Corner







                                                                                          Design. Discuss. Deliver.

                                                                                          Create visually engaging stories with Zoho Show.

                                                                                          Get Started Now


                                                                                            Zoho Show Resources


                                                                                              Zoho Writer Writer

                                                                                              Get Started. Write Away!

                                                                                              Writer is a powerful online word processor, designed for collaborative work.

                                                                                                Zoho CRM コンテンツ






                                                                                                  Nederlandse Hulpbronnen


                                                                                                      ご検討中の方




                                                                                                            • Recent Topics

                                                                                                            • COMPLAINT : Sleeping & Useless Support Team. GMail is better then..

                                                                                                              [## 118256452 ##] License upgrade issues: As a reseller, I tried to upgrade 1 license for my customer. It shown error. Raised complaints via Email/Chat/Phone support. Its been more than a week, still keep asking damn questions and comfirmations on once
                                                                                                            • Introducing the Reviews sub-module in Zoho Recruit

                                                                                                              Across every recruitment process, candidates are assessed by multiple stakeholders—recruiters, interviewers, hiring managers, and clients. These evaluations influence hiring decisions, yet they often exist in silos across assessments, emails, or interview
                                                                                                            • Unable to add a organization with US location

                                                                                                              I have created a Zoho Books trial account and since I am using Zoho People and payroll, Zoho Books has taken my existing credentials and created an Indian entity, but I am not able to add a US entity. How to add a US entity?
                                                                                                            • Two-Way Sync Zoho CRM Custom Module with Zoho FSM Company Addresses

                                                                                                              Business fact: Many companies don't just have one location. They have multiple locations (some have many), with addresses we need to know for service, deliveries, etc. We have created a custom "Sites" module in Zoho CRM to store an Account/Company's addresses
                                                                                                            • Meet the latest feature of Zoho Sheet: Lock Cells

                                                                                                              We are happy to announce the release of one of the most awaited features in Zoho Sheet. ​You can now lock the cells that you wish to keep ​secure. Once you are done with editing cells, you can lock them so that they won't be modified anymore. We believe that this feature will be a great addition to our existing set of collaboration features and is intended to improve your collaboration experience. You can access this new feature Lock from Data tab. Apart from being able to lock individual cell ranges,
                                                                                                            • Error message when creating group

                                                                                                              I get two error messages when creating a group. One says it already exists, but it doesn't not already exist. See screenshots.
                                                                                                            • What are the benefits of procurement software in a growing business setup?

                                                                                                              I’ve been exploring tools that can help automate purchasing and vendor-related tasks. I keep hearing about the benefits of procurement software, especially for businesses that are scaling. I want to understand how it helps in streamlining operations,
                                                                                                            • Add Desk Account comments using Flow

                                                                                                              The triggers and actions for Zoho Desk available in Flow are quite extensive, but I don't see anything related to Account-level Comments. There are actions to add comments to Tickets, Contacts, Tasks, and Topics, but nothing for Accounts. Am I missing
                                                                                                            • workflow field update will Not triggering another workflow rule

                                                                                                              I have a Workflow rule that is supposed to get triggered when a field is modified to certain value. This field is actually the lead status and when the lead status changes to "Client Not Responding" . I have a series of emails that go out to re-engage
                                                                                                            • Critical Feature Gaps Between Zoho Books and Zoho Finance Module in CRM

                                                                                                              We are extensively using Zoho Finance Module in our organization because of The Record Sharing feature provided by CRM something thats not possible in Books, we are able to limit what Sales Orders, Purchase Orders, Estimates an employee can see based
                                                                                                            • Disable Refresh, or hold info after refresh.

                                                                                                              Is there a way to hold the info entered in a form if the page refreshes, or to disable refresh of the form.
                                                                                                            • changing the Delivery Challan Heading

                                                                                                              Hi We want to change the Delivery Challan Heading as per our requirement. Like Returnable/Non Returnable/Delivery challan. But it is not happening here. is it possible to change advise. Thanks Radha
                                                                                                            • ZohoCRM上での接触回数の集計や評価について

                                                                                                              当方toB営業を行う会社なのですが、 顧客ごとの接触手段と接触回数を蓄積してKPIや評価指標としてレポーティングしたいのですが、どのタブでどのような運用をするのが適切でしょうか。 商談タブ、取引先タブ、連絡先タブそれぞれにおいて運用方法を考えましたがイメージが湧かず、ご教授いただければ幸いです。
                                                                                                            • 【Zoho Backstage】2025年4月のアップデート紹介

                                                                                                              本投稿は、本社のZoho Desk コミュニティに投稿された以下の記事を翻訳し、一部抜粋したものです。 What's New - April 2025 | Zoho Backstage ユーザーの皆さま、こんにちは。コミュニティチームの中野です。 本投稿では、Zoho Backstage の直近のアップデートを4点抜粋して、ご紹介します。 目次 1.参加者リストのエクスポート 2.予約メールに添付ファイルを追加 3.セッションの詳細を登壇者のメールに追加 4.登録フォームへの日時(Time)項目追加
                                                                                                            • Record template - How to format a table

                                                                                                              HI, I have a table in my form. I want to extract that in to my record template as a comma separated list - anyone else tried this? e.g. My Form... row1 value1 row 2 value2 " " My Template: my rows contain: val ue1, value2
                                                                                                            • Allow reconciliation for bank acct with no transactions for month

                                                                                                              Is there a way to allow a bank reconciliation to take place when there are no transactions for the month? I am unable to create a reconciliation for the month because there are no transactions to select. I want to be able to attach the bank statement
                                                                                                            • Direct Integration Between Zoho Cliq Meetings and Google Calendar

                                                                                                              Dear Zoho Team, We’d like to submit the following feature request based on our current use case and the challenges we’re facing: 🎯 Feature Request: Enable meetings scheduled in Zoho Cliq to be automatically added to the host's Google Calendar, not just
                                                                                                            • error while adding a domain

                                                                                                              I am adding a domain to admin console but they're showing this kind of error! pls help me with this.
                                                                                                            • Multiple barcodes and sku aliases

                                                                                                              Hi, It would be great if you could add the following features: Allocating multiple barcodes to a product as sometimes different barcodes are in circulation in a particular market. As well as different barcodes, sometimes, different SKUs are used by different
                                                                                                            • Video Interview features

                                                                                                              I tested the video interview feature. It's supported only on desktop version of chrome/firefox. Most of the times, the candidates are available on their cellphone. Need to have this for mobile devices too.
                                                                                                            • Different Domain Name Sync AD Password to Zoho Mail

                                                                                                              Hello, may I ask if how to configure or is possible to sync AD password to Zoho mail? Example AD domain name is xaxis.net and zoho mail domain name is yaxis.net.
                                                                                                            • Announcing New Features in Trident for macOS (v.1.19.0)

                                                                                                              Hello everyone! Trident for macOS is here with interesting features and enhancements to elevate your workplace communication. Let's take a quick look at them. View and manage .pst files. A .pst (Personal Storage Table) file is an Outlook Data Storage
                                                                                                            • Creating Email template that attaches file uploaded in specific field.

                                                                                                              If there's a way to do this using Zoho CRM's built-in features, then this has eluded me! I'm looking to create a workflow that automatically sends an email upon execution, and that email includes an attachment uploaded in a specific field. Email templates
                                                                                                            • User manual as PDF

                                                                                                              Hi, on the User Manual pages (for CRM, Support and other Zoho Apps) is a print button, but mostly the pages contain only links to other pages. So, printing the manual is of no use. Is there any PDF version of the FULL manual? Or any other source where
                                                                                                            • Custom Field for Subscription

                                                                                                              Hi, I can't find a way to add a custom field (to contain a license key generated from our software) against a subscription? Is the only place to add this information in the Invoice module (as custom field for invoice)? When a customer views his subscription via the customer portal, there appears no way to display a license key for them? The invoice is not the natural place to store a license key for a particular subscription, so where else can this be stored and displayed?
                                                                                                            • Disable fields in multiple subform rows

                                                                                                              Hello everybody! I have an odd one here. I have a subform that collects hours of operation. It contains these fields: Days, Type, Open, and Closed. On load of the form I add 7 rows with Mon - Sun in the Days field. I then disable that field and the add/delete
                                                                                                            • Deal Product reference

                                                                                                              Hello All, I'm trying to use Zoho Writer to dynamically create a statement of work document. Our statement of work is heavily dependent on what products are included in the deal. As such, I need to be able to add or remove sections of text depending on
                                                                                                            • How to record the Customer Payment received against previous year invoice

                                                                                                              Hi . How to adjust the receipt of this payment in customer account statement received for previous year invoices, which are not there in the statement with us. Because it is showing as prepaid expenses or unearned revenue Advise Thanks radha
                                                                                                            • Discripency in inventory adjustment value and FIFO cost lot tracking report report

                                                                                                              In zohobooks, I have added 200 bag of itemA with unit rate is Rs.1408 as opening stock on Apr01/2025, after that i make a inventory adjustment for 100 bag that I transfer to stock in process account, after that I make a purchase bill for the same item
                                                                                                            • How do I add todays date to merge field

                                                                                                              I don't see any selection of todays date when creating a letter.  Surely the date option of printing is standard? John
                                                                                                            • Zoho FSM API to search Zoho FSM Assets by Asset_Number?

                                                                                                              How can I search or otherwise retrieve an Asset from the Assets module in Zoho FSM using the Asset_Number? The API docs seem to say that the only field that can be searched is the Asset Name. Is this true? https://www.zoho.com/fsm/developer/help/api/search-records.html
                                                                                                            • Sync Creator form submissions to WorkDrive folder

                                                                                                              I've made 10 Creator applications, and need to sync my each application's submissions into a WorkDrive folder. I need the form submissions to be PDF file type and sync to a specific folder for documentation purposes. I have tried to use a workflow, but
                                                                                                            • Add Voting Polls Feature Similar to WhatsApp to Zoho Cliq

                                                                                                              Hi Zoho Cliq Team, Hope you're doing well. We are using the Voting Polls feature in WhatsApp (see: WhatsApp Voting Polls FAQ), and we believe a similar functionality would be extremely valuable in Zoho Cliq. Currently, when our teams want to quickly gather
                                                                                                            • ZML Snippet: Auto Refresh Section

                                                                                                              Is there a way that I can set an auto refresh on each of the ZML snippet only and not the entire page? Just wondering..
                                                                                                            • Availability of the Custom Sort Order feature for Windows and Mac platforms??

                                                                                                              Notebook Team, I hope this message finds you well. I am reaching out to inquire about the current status and planned updates for the Custom sort order feature within your application. A year ago, it was mentioned that this feature is supported on iOS,
                                                                                                            • Have you checked your Email headers for DKIM Failure?

                                                                                                              Have you taken a look at your email headers for DKIM failures even with DKIM set up properly? I've had DKIM successfully set up for many months. My account currently shows Email Verified and Authenticated. Big green check marks. Email Relay is also showing
                                                                                                            • Wizard Form

                                                                                                              I would like the option to create a wizard that works when you create a record and contacts that are already in the CRM captured with a web 2 lead form (field data inserted in to the wizard).  Having the option to create up to 3/4 segments per screen
                                                                                                            • Pivot Table - Zoho Analytics

                                                                                                              I'm creating a Profit and Loss chart in Zoho Analytics using the Pivot Chart feature. While Net Profit can be calculated using the total value, I also need to calculate and display the Gross Profit/Loss directly within the chart. To do this, I need to
                                                                                                            • Fetch function not working for CRM Contacts

                                                                                                              I've created a flow that checks if a contact exists in CRM (based on form input), and if it does, then it updates one of the fields for the contact. In my test, the fetch function correctly identifies that a contact exists (based on email address), but
                                                                                                            • Clone a project

                                                                                                              To whom it may concern, I did a quick search of the forum and found nothing relating to this idea, so am posting fresh. The service that our company provides means that we follow an essentially identical process for each new job, and this includes the time frames for each stage. Ideally we would have a complete "template" project, with all the task lists and tasks in place with associated start dates, due dates (and by extension, duration) and - most importantly - the dependencies between tasks so
                                                                                                            • Next Page