# Set up membership plans and dues

> A plan is what belonging costs: a join fee, recurring dues, when they are billed, and what the tier gets in return.

Source: https://www.aerscheduler.com/docs/billing/set-up-membership-dues
Section: Billing and payments. For: Owners, Admins.

`Settings → Memberships → Add plan` (web console). A plan is one tier: a name, an
optional one-time join fee, optional recurring dues, when those dues are billed, and what
the tier gets in return. Full, associate and student rate are three plans, not three
settings on one.

**Who can do this:** Owners, Admins

## What a plan is

A plan is what your organization sells: the cost of belonging, and what belonging buys.
Every tier you offer is its own plan.

Each plan carries some or all of:

| Part of a plan           | What it is                                                   |
| ------------------------ | ------------------------------------------------------------ |
| Join fee                 | A one-time charge when somebody joins                        |
| Dues                     | A recurring charge, monthly, quarterly or annual             |
| Billing day              | A fixed day of the month, or each member's own anniversary   |
| Prorate the first period | Whether the stub before the first full period is charged     |
| Days to pay              | What gives a dues invoice a due date                         |
| Booking window           | How far ahead this tier may book                             |
| Aircraft rates           | A per-tail hourly rate for this tier                         |
| Membership agreement     | Which document type members on this tier should have on file |

![Settings, Memberships](https://www.aerscheduler.com/docs/memberships-plans-list.png)

> **Note:** Dues can only actually be invoiced once Billing is enabled and Stripe is connected. You can
> build plans before that, but nothing will bill. See
> [Turn on invoicing and card payments](https://www.aerscheduler.com/docs/billing/turn-on-invoicing-and-card-payments).

## Create a plan

1. **Open Settings → Memberships and click Add plan**

2. **Name and describe the plan**

   Use the name your members already use: Full member, Associate, Student rate.

3. **Enter the join fee, if there is one**

   You set the amount and how it reads on the invoice.

4. **Enter the dues**

   An amount, an interval under Every (Monthly, Quarterly or Annually), and the wording that
   appears on the invoice.

5. **Decide when dues are billed**

   Either Bill everyone on the same day with a Billing day, or turn that off so each member is
   billed on their own anniversary.

6. **Set Prorate the first period and Days to pay**

7. **Optionally set a Booking window and a Membership agreement**

8. **Click Create plan**

   Reopen the saved plan to set per-aircraft rates for the tier, which are only offered once
   the plan exists.

New plans appear in the plan pickers on the invite and join-request screens, so you can put
somebody on a tier as you bring them in.

## Join fee and dues

The join fee is charged once, when the member joins. Dues repeat on the interval you chose.
Both carry their own wording, which is what the member reads on the invoice, so write them
the way your club already talks: "2026 annual dues" beats "Dues".

Your school's service fee percentage, if you have set one, is added to dues invoices in the
same way it is added to flight invoices.

## Bill everyone on the same day, or on their own anniversary

Turn Bill everyone on the same day on and pick a Billing day, and the whole tier is billed
together. The day is capped at 28 so that every month has one.

Turn it off and each member is billed on the anniversary of their own start date. That is
smoother for you and less predictable for the treasurer.

![Membership plan editor](https://www.aerscheduler.com/docs/membership-plan-editor.png)

## Prorate the first period

This only matters when the plan bills everyone on the same day, because that is the only
case that produces a stub.

With prorating on, the gap between joining and the first full period is charged by whole
days against the length of the period it comes before. A 10-day stub on a quarterly plan is
10/92 of a quarter.

The stub is billed before the first full period, at its own smaller price. That is why the
amount shown under Next period on a new member's record can be less than the plan's dues.

## Days to pay

This is what gives a dues invoice a due date at all. Fill it in and the invoice carries a
deadline, which is what the automatic reminder sweep chases against. Leave it blank and the
dues invoice has no due date, and reminders fall back to chasing it once it is a week old.

## Booking window and per aircraft tier rates

These are the two entitlements a plan can carry.

**Booking window** refuses a booking further ahead than the tier allows, for every
reservation type. It is read live at the moment of booking.

**Aircraft rates** set a per-tier hourly rate for a given tail, inside a saved plan. It is
sparse on purpose: leave an aircraft blank and members on the tier are billed that tail's
published rate.

> **Careful:** A tier rate is only used when every billable pilot on the booking resolves to the same
> tier. A booking that mixes tiers, or that includes somebody on no plan at all, falls back
> to the aircraft's published rate. This is the usual reason a members-rate flight bills at
> the standard rate.

> **Note:** Only an active membership carries the tier's booking window. A member you have paused falls
> back to no limit rather than to the strictest one.

## The membership agreement

This names the document type a member on this plan is meant to have on file. It is a
reminder for your own records: AerScheduler does not collect signatures, and nothing about
a member is blocked when the agreement is missing.

## Changing a plan later

> **Important:** Prices and entitlements behave in opposite directions, and this is the single thing people
> get wrong about plans.

| What you change                 | Who it affects                                                                                                                                            |
| ------------------------------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| Join fee, dues amount, interval | Only people who join after you save. Existing members keep the price they joined at, because their prices were snapshotted when their membership started. |
| Booking window                  | Everybody on the tier, as soon as you save, including members who joined years ago.                                                                       |
| Aircraft rates                  | Everybody on the tier, as soon as you save.                                                                                                               |

To move an existing member onto today's price, use Change plan on their record, which takes
effect from their next period. See
[Add a member to a plan](https://www.aerscheduler.com/docs/billing/add-a-member-to-a-plan).

Plans are retired, never deleted. Retire hides a plan from the pickers and lists it
separately without touching anybody who is on it; Restore brings it back.

## Automatic dues billing

Bill dues automatically raises each period overnight as it comes due, instead of you
pressing Bill now.

> **Careful:** It is opt in twice. The plan has to have it, and each member's own membership has to have
> inherited it. A member added before you switched it on at plan level will not pick it up,
> so check the Bill dues automatically toggle on the person's Billing tab as well.

## Related

- [Add a member to a plan](https://www.aerscheduler.com/docs/billing/add-a-member-to-a-plan): Putting somebody on a plan and billing their dues.
- [Aircraft and instruction rates](https://www.aerscheduler.com/docs/billing/set-aircraft-and-instruction-rates): The published rates a tier rate overrides.