This document contains all the information related to subscription renewal payment failure notifications for admins, email customization, and activation.
Overview
“Renewal Payment Failure” is the email notification sent automatically to admins when a customer’s subscription renewal payment fails.
This notification provides all relevant subscription details, payment information, and customer contact info so admins can quickly follow up and help resolve the issue.
The email includes:
- Customer name
- Subscription ID
- Subscription start date
- Payment method
- Product details (title, variation, quantity, and price)
- Subtotal
- Shipping
- Taxes
- Discounts
- Total amount
- Customer email for direct contact
This ensures admins can proactively manage payment failures and reduce subscription downtime.
Pre-requisites: Before enabling email notifications, ensure your WordPress site is configured to send emails:
- SMTP plugin required: WordPress doesn’t reliably send emails by default. Install and configure an SMTP plugin like WP Mail SMTP.
- Email service provider: Connect your SMTP plugin to a transactional email service (Brevo, Mailgun, SendGrid, Amazon SES, or your hosting provider’s SMTP).
- Match sender details: Ensure that the From Email and From Name values configured in Sublium Subscriptions email notifications exactly match the sender details set in your SMTP plugin.
- Test your setup: Send a test email from your SMTP plugin to confirm emails are delivering before enabling Sublium notifications.
Without proper email configuration, notifications will fail silently.
For more details, refer to our doc on how to set up WP SMTP.
Access “Renewal Payment Failure” Email Notification
Navigate to Sublium Subscriptions ⇒ Settings ⇒ Notifications.
Under the Admin tab, you will find the Renewal Payment Failure email notification for admins.
When It Is Sent
This email is sent when:
- A customer’s subscription renewal payment fails
- A renewal attempt is marked as failed in WooCommerce
Recipient
By default, this email is sent to the admin email address ({{admin_email}}).
Email Customization
You can customize this notification using two editor types:
- Rich Text
- Visual Editor
A prebuilt Renewal Payment Failure template is available in both editors, which can be modified or rebuilt as needed.
Guide:For more details, check our documentation on email customization.
Personalization
Sublium Subscriptions offers merge tags to personalize the subject line, preview text, and email body.
Guide: For more details, check our documentation on Merge Tags
How To Activate
To activate the Renewal Payment Failure email for admins, turn ON the toggle next to the notification inside Sublium Subscriptions.
This setup ensures admins are immediately informed when a subscription renewal payment fails, can access all payment and customer details, and take prompt action to resolve the issue.
Troubleshooting
Emails not sending
- Confirm your SMTP plugin is configured and sending test emails successfully
- Check your SMTP plugin’s email logs for failed delivery attempts
- Verify the notification toggle is enabled
- Ensure the customer has a valid email address on their order
Merge tags showing as plain text
- Confirm you copied the full merge tag, including the curly braces, e.g., {{subscriber_first_name}}
- Check for extra spaces inside the merge tag
- Use only merge tags from the official list; custom tags won’t work
Email is going to spam
- Configure SPF, DKIM, and DMARC records for your sending domain
- Avoid spam trigger words in your subject line
- Use a reputable transactional email service
Email looks broken or unstyled
- Test across multiple email clients (Gmail, Outlook, Apple Mail)
- Avoid complex CSS, as email clients have limited style support
- Use the Visual Editor’s built-in templates for better compatibility
