Handling Member Renewals

Last Update :  August 2026

Because the users of the MMS have such a wide variety of skill sets and backgrounds, this document is written under the assumption that the reader may or may not have experience in handling membership renewals.

1. Terminology

• term - This refers to how memberships are billed, in terms of monthly or yearly membership. It also could refer to a particular year or month that a membership is in force. If an organization has annual memberships, a example of a member's term of membership might be August 1, 2003 - August 1, 2004.
• effective date - the date when a member's renewal term begins.
• expiration date - the date when a member's renewal term ends.
• due date - for a given invoice (which contains a particular renewal term for a member), this is the date when dues must be paid in order to continue membership. The due date is computed relative to the effective date of the renewal term.
• invoice posting date- the date at which invoice records are created in the system (MMS).
• batch renewals - a batch process that creates invoice records at night. The MMS does this at 2:00 AM EST.

2. Procedures

The key to success in handling membership renewals is developing a monthly set of procedures that your organization consistently executes. Typically, this would involve sending billing notifications (invoices) and recording the payments/cancellations that are returned afterwards.

Creating invoice records - these are the records that represent amounts that are to be billed to members (or accounts). The MMS can be set up to do this automatically. The MMS will create an invoice record several days before the effective date of the renewal. This lead time is configurable via the MMS Configuration page, so that you can have plenty of time to notify members before their membership expires. During creation, the due date of the invoice is based on the effective date of the renewal. Usually it is equal to the effective date, but can be offset earlier or later by a few days, using the "Due Date Lead" field within MMS Configuration.

Sending notifications - after the invoice records are created, the member will have to be notified that their membership is about to expire and how to remit payment to continue their membership. This can be done via conventional mail or by email notifications. Notifications can also be sent if a member is past due in paying dues. Sometimes, members will lose their renewal notification emails. You can re-send these notifications to them manually within member billing. You can also offer members the opportunity to request a renewal email themselves by entering their username or email (ask us about this feature).

Receiving payments / Dropping non-pays - after notifications have been sent, what remains is to wait for the members' responses. When a payment is sent in by check, it must be recorded in the system. If a member makes a renewal payment online, it is recorded automatically at that time. 

3. Annual Renewals

Since annually processed renewals are so far apart for an individual member, it's important to give adequate notice to the member that their membership is about to expire. It's also important to note that when an annual membership comes up for renewal, the member has to make a more significant choice as to whether or not to continue their membership; compared to their monthly membership counterparts. 

Here's a sample procedure for handling annual renewals-

4. Auto-drop

For organizations that use the auto-drop feature, here is how it works:

When enabled (via MMS Configuration), unpaid members will be dropped (status changed to dropped, member will no longer have access to the MMS, and will not be on the various member lists).

Unpaid members are members whose current invoice record (the latest invoice record associated with them) is both unpaid and the due date has passed the grace period. This grace period that can be set within MMS Configuration - "Auto-Drop Days".

For example, if a member's current invoice record is for a renewal 03/01/06-03/01/07, and the due date is 03/01/06 (corresponding to the effective date), and the grace period is 60 days. This member will be dropped automatically on 04/30/06 (60 days past the due date) unless a payment is applied to the invoice (a payment entered into the system).

NOTE: We do not recommend using auto-drop for organizations with fixed, annual memberships (all members renew at the same time each year). If at the end of your annual renewal processing you want to drop the unpaid members, contact us to help you.