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A gift subscription is bought by one person and received by another. Any subscription package can be gifted: the customer chooses This is a gift at checkout, and there is nothing to set up on the package itself. The giver pays for one shipment at a time, on their own card, the first at checkout. How many more they pay for, and what happens after, is their choice.

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What the giver chooses

At checkout the giver chooses how the gift is paid for, under a heading you can rename in Settings > Branding & Web Components > Checkout:

They take it over

The giver pays for the first shipment at checkout. Then it becomes the recipient’s, and they pay from the next renewal.

Gift a set number

The giver pays for a number of shipments from your list, each as it’s sent. Then it stops.

Keep gifting it

The giver pays for every shipment, each as it’s sent, until somebody cancels.
The checkout choice of how a gift subscription is paid for
They take it over is the default. Keep gifting it is never pre-selected, since a recurring charge the giver didn’t expect is the single biggest source of chargebacks on gifts. Choosing a set number asks How many inside the option, offering the numbers you list under Settings > Cart & Checkout (3, 6 and 12 unless you change them), and says how the giver will pay: the first today, and each of the rest when it is sent.
Gifts used to be sold from a separate, prepaid gift package. That has been withdrawn: an ordinary package gifted at checkout now does the job, and the product page no longer offers For me or As a gift.

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Who pays and who receives

A gift subscription separates the two:
  • The giver owns it and pays for the shipments they chose
  • The recipient receives the deliveries and, if the giver chose to hand it over, takes it over
Each renewal the giver pays for is an order in the giver’s name, charged to the card they paid with at checkout, marked as a gift and sent to the recipient. Billing email, renewal reminders and failed-payment emails go to the giver, so the person receiving the gift never sees a price or a payment request for it. The giver’s card is kept apart from the recipient’s own payment methods, and is never used once the giver has finished paying. An account is created for the recipient so they can manage their deliveries, which is why a gift subscription needs the recipient’s email address at checkout.
A recipient who later signs up with the gifted address inherits the subscription, rather than ending up with a duplicate account.

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The reveal date

Nothing reaches the recipient before the date the giver chose. See Tell them on for how the timing works. The giver is sent a Gift Subscription Scheduled email at the point of purchase, confirming that nothing reaches the recipient until then, which is otherwise the first thing they write in to ask.

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When the giver’s shipments are done

Once the giver has paid for the last of their shipments, the gift changes on the day its next renewal falls due:
  • They take it over - the giver is removed and it becomes an ordinary subscription in the recipient’s name, renewing on the date it was due. It is charged to their card if they have saved one, and otherwise goes through the same renewal reminder, payment link and failed-payment emails as any subscriber without one
  • Gift a set number - it ends, with the status expired, and the recipient is told the last shipment has been sent
Keep gifting it never reaches this point. The giver goes on paying for each shipment until they, or you, cancel it. Both people are told an ending is coming, separately and at different times. The giver hears first, 30 days before the renewal it ends on, so they get the chance to keep it going before the recipient is told anything. The recipient hears at 14 days, and only where they are taking it over, since that’s the only case with something for them to do.

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On the subscription

A gift subscription carries a Gift block on its detail page:
  • Paid for by - the giver, linking to their customer record
  • Tell them on / Told on - the reveal date
  • Deliveries left - for a set number, how many of the giver’s shipments are still to be charged, for example 2 of 6. Not shown on a gift the giver keeps paying for
  • When it runs out - what the giver chose, spelled out so you can answer “so what happens in March?” without knowing the stored values
A gift’s package can’t be changed, either from the admin or from the recipient’s account, since the giver chose and is paying for that package at that price.

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Cancelling

Cancelling a gift the giver is still paying for stops the charges, not the shipment already paid for. That one is still sent, and the gift ends at the renewal after it. This is different from an ordinary subscription, which still ends immediately when cancelled.

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Emails

The life of a gift is covered by these emails, all editable under Settings > Notifications in the Gift group: A giver who keeps gifting is reminded of each charge by the ordinary renewal reminder emails, sent to them rather than to the recipient, so Gift Renewal Upcoming is no longer sent.