Suspending and Resuming Subscriptions
Introduction
Microsoft enables partners to suspend and later resume the operational services of prepaid Microsoft 365 subscription-based offers. This functionality is particularly useful in scenarios where a customer fails to fulfill payment obligations to the partner.
In the Modern New Commerce Experience (NCE) platform, Microsoft has updated the business logic for these actions. What was previously known as Suspend in the legacy Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) platform is now referred to as Dunning in NCE. For more details on how this functionality behaves, refer to the Expected Behaviors sections below.
Scope
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Program: Cloud Solution Provider (CSP)
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Platform: Modern New Commerce Experience (NCE) only
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Regions: Worldwide except China and embargoed countries
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Products: NCE Microsoft 365 only
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Offers: All Public and Specialized
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Qualifications: All
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Function: Suspend (Dun), Resume
Expected Microsoft Behaviors and Limitations
In the NCE platform, the Suspend function is implemented using Dunning logic. When a partner initiates a Suspend (Dun) action on a subscription, Microsoft will:
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Pause delivery of the associated operational services to the customer.
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Continue billing the direct-billed partner without interruption.
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Maintain the original subscription commitment term end date.
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Disable AutoRenew.
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Remove any scheduled changes for the next commitment term, as AutoRenew is no longer active.
When a partner initiates a Resume action, Microsoft will:
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Resume delivery of the operational services to the customer.
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Continue billing the direct-billed partner without interruption.
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Keep the original subscription commitment term end date unchanged.
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Leave AutoRenew disabled.
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Not restore any previously scheduled changes.
Partner considerations:
If desired, partners may manually:
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Re-enable AutoRenew.
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Reconfigure any scheduled changes.
Note: If a Suspended (Dunned) subscription comes to its commitment term end, it will transition to Expired status, due to AutoRenew being disabled.
Expected CloudBlue Behaviors and Limitations
CloudBlue generally aligns with Microsoft’s behavior, with one key exception when a Suspended (Dunned) subscription reaches its commitment term end.
Microsoft Actions:
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Transition the subscription to Expired status.
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Stop operational service and billing.
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Prevent recovery from the Expired status.
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Initiate Data Retention Policies.
CloudBlue Actions:
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Maintain the subscription in Suspended status and not transition to Expired status.
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Stop operational service and billing.
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Prevent recovery from this status.
The Suspended (Dunned) and Expired subscription will remain visible to resellers and customers in their CloudBlue Commerce control panels.
If commercially desired, the marketplace operator will need to initiate a manual back-end task to remove this subscription from the CloudBlue platform.