During subscription changes such as a quantity reduction or cancellation, Billing generates a negative invoice which then gets converted to a credit memo. This action triggers the automated refund process, where Billing automatically initiates the refund to the original payment method.
Required Editions
| Available in: Lightning Experience |
| Available in: Enterprise, Unlimited, and Developer Editions with the Revenue Cloud Billing license. Contact your Salesforce account executive for more information. |
| User Permissions Needed | |
|---|---|
| To initiate automated refunds on negative and canceled invoices: |
Billing Admin permission set OR Credit Memo Operations User permission set |
How Automated Refund Process Works
When an amendment or cancellation is applied to a subscription associated with a fully settled invoice, Billing follows this sequence.
- Calculate the refund amount based on the original invoice and the amendment or cancellation invoice.
- Generate a credit memo to settle the original invoice.
- Initiate refund orchestration process to issue the refund to the original payment method.
To initiate funds, in Setup, find and select Billing Settings, and then turn on these features.
- Issue Refunds and Settle Balances
- Apply Credits to Posted Invoices
Billing automatically applies the balances of credit memo to settle the balances of posted invoices based on the credit application level.
To trace the refund back to its original transaction, follow these steps.
- Open the credit memo generated by the amendment or cancellation.
- Review the Payment and Invoice Applications section to view the original invoice balance, the unapplied amount, and the refund application details.
- Confirm the refund amount and the payment method used for processing the refund.
A customer account has a one-year subscription starting in March 2026, totaling $3,000. The original invoice is generated, activated, and fully settled via a payment method linked to a payment gateway.
However, when an amendment reduces the subscription quantity by five, Billing generates amendment billing schedules, and applies a credit of $825 to the posted invoices. Billing automatically triggers the automated refund process, and the $825 refund amount is settled against the same payment method used in the initial transaction.