Keep platform billing separate from customer checkout
Open Dashboard > Billing & Subscription to manage your Cottage CMS subscription. The billing portal is for the platform payment method and invoices; customer payments still follow your Square or configured checkout settings.
Plan availability: Free has no recurring platform subscription. Pro and Scale are paid platform plans with monthly and annual intervals shown by the active checkout configuration. Managed domain registration and renewal, SMS, taxes, and optional services can be separately billed. Legacy Lifetime is not a new checkout option.
Recover a billing issue
- Open Billing and choose the payment-method or billing-portal action.
- Update the card or payment method in Stripe’s secure portal.
- Return to Cottage CMS and wait for the live subscription and invoice status to refresh.
- If an open Stripe invoice still has an amount due, choose Pay Outstanding Invoice when the action appears.
- Reopen the feature that was unavailable and confirm its plan entitlement is active.
What customers see
During a recoverable payment issue, only the documented custom-domain storefront grace path may remain available. Unrelated paid features can close until payment is current. Customers may therefore reach the platform address while a paid domain or tool is recovering.
Common problems
- No invoice action appears. Billing only shows a supported open Stripe invoice with an amount remaining and a hosted invoice URL.
- The portal return looks stale. Refresh Billing so it checks Stripe’s live subscription and invoice state.
- A domain charge is missing from platform history. Managed domain renewals are separate annual subscriptions.
- Payment is past due but the feature is still locked. Custom-domain grace does not mean all paid feature gates remain open.
Next steps
Keywords
Billing and Subscription, Stripe, billing portal, payment method, Pay Outstanding Invoice, past due, invoice, renewal, payment recovery