Set up discounts for subscription orders
Learn how to configure BON loyalty discount codes to apply to one-time purchases, subscriptions, or both – and control how discounts behave across recurring payments
IMPORTANT NOTES:
- You will need to subscribe to the Basic plan or higher to unlock this feature. Check out our Pricing plans for more details.
- This feature is supported only when there is a subscription app installed.
Understand subscription discount options
When a reward’s purchase type is set to Subscriptions (or Both), merchants can choose how the discount behaves across recurring charges:
Option | What it does |
Limit to the first payment | Discount applies once, on the first subscription charge. |
Limit to multiple recurring payment | Discount applies to a fixed number of recurring charges, then stops. |
Apply to all recurring payments | Discount applies to all recurring charges for the life of the subscription. |
Customers see whether a reward is redeemable against a one-time purchase, a subscription, or both, at the moment they redeem it – so there’s no confusion at checkout.
How “specific number of payments” behaves:
A discount configured for, say, 5 recurring payments:
- Can be applied once and benefit up to 5 subsequent charges (including the first).
- Cannot be applied for 2 payments, removed, and then re-applied later for the remaining 3.
- Cannot be split across two subscription contracts (e.g. 2 payments on one, 3 on another).
Verify subscription support in the merchant’s store
The purchase-type option only appears for stores that support subscriptions. A store supports subscriptions when:
- A subscription management app (e.g. Recurrpay, Seal Subscription App) is installed, an
- At least one subscription billing plan is linked to a product.
Quick check for merchants:
- Click on the button ‘Help me check’ in the discount configuration window to check if your store works with subscriptions. OR,
- Go to Shopify Admin > Discounts > Create discount. If purchase-type options appear there, the store supports subscriptions and BON’s setting will work.
Configure purchase type in BON Admin
Even if a store supports subscriptions, the subscription app itself must support discount codes for the discount to apply to a shopper’s current subscription. Otherwise, the discount can only attach to new subscription contracts at checkout.
To make a BON reward compatible with subscriptions:
- Go to Points program > Redeem points
- Select the reward you want to edit (e.g. Amount discount).
- In the Purchase type section, choose one of:
One-time purchase
Subscriptions
Both - If you selected Subscriptions or Both, choose the recurring behavior: First payment only, Specific number of payments, or Every payment.
- Save the reward.
Once configured, the discount can be applied:
- At Shopify checkout, when a shopper is purchasing a subscription product.
- Through the subscription management portal provided by the merchant’s subscription app (if that app supports discount codes).
Applying loyalty discounts to subscriptions
- New subscription orders: shoppers redeem their BON reward as a discount code at Shopify checkout, same as any other purchase.
- Existing subscriptions: shoppers manage this through their subscription app’s customer portal – this only works if the subscription app supports applying/editing discount codes on active contracts.
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