Subscription Billing Without the Per-Transaction Tax on Top.
Stripe Billing adds 0.5-0.8% on top of Stripe's standard 2.9% + 30¢ processing. Chargify (now Maxio) charges $599-3,499/month + 0.7% transaction fee. Recurly + similar models add 0.4-0.9% per-subscription on top of processor. At $5M-50M ARR these markups add up to $35-450K/year. Aeion Billing replaces them at $0 — included free with any Aeion module (Commerce, Finance, etc.) — plus 0% Aeion fee. You still pay Stripe's 2.9% + 30¢ — but no additional billing-platform tax.
Aeion Billing ↔ Stripe Billing / Chargify / Recurly Mapping
Subscription Management
Plans, tiers, add-ons, trials, free and paid — customers manage their own upgrades and downgrades from a self-service portal instead of emailing support, and each plan can carry its own custom pricing. Read Billing →
Usage-Based + Metered Billing
Meter by API call, seat, event, or gigabyte, with volume and graduated tiered pricing tracked in real time — the usage-billing complexity that used to require Chargify's most involved configuration comes built in.
Multi-Currency + Multi-Region
Bill in 130+ currencies with automatic FX conversion, price by region, and hand tax calculation off to Avalara or an equivalent provider per jurisdiction — so expanding into a new market doesn't mean rebuilding your billing logic.
Dunning + Retention
When a card fails, a recovery sequence kicks off automatically with smart-timed retries, and customers get scored for churn risk so your team knows who's worth a personal save call — the ground Churnly and Stripe's own Smart Retries used to cover, now native.
Per-Customer Invoicing
Custom invoices per customer, in their own language, on Net-30/60/90 terms, with self-service access to their invoice history — including PO-based invoicing for B2B customers who need to pay on their own terms, not just a card on file.
Multi-Provider Payment
Take payments through Stripe, Adyen, Square, PayPal, Razorpay, or crypto via Coinbase Commerce, with a primary processor and fallback set per tenant — so a processor outage or a bad rate negotiation never holds your revenue hostage.
Revenue Recognition (ASC 606)
Deferred revenue schedules run automatically per product and per contract, giving SaaS finance teams ASC 606-compliant recognition without exporting to a dedicated rev-rec tool. Read Finance →
AI Dunning + Recovery
AeionClaw's finance-focused AI drafts personalized recovery emails for failed payments, flags your highest-LTV at-risk customers for a human save call, and predicts churn 30-60 days out — so retention work starts before the cancellation, not after. Read Claw →
The Billing Markup Math
| MRR | Annual | Stripe (2.9%) | + Stripe Billing (0.5-0.8%) | + Chargify (0.7%) | + Recurly (0.4-0.9%) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| $50K | $600K | $17.4K | +$3-4.8K | +$4.2K | +$2.4-5.4K |
| $200K | $2.4M | $69.6K | +$12-19.2K | +$16.8K | +$9.6-21.6K |
| $500K | $6M | $174K | +$30-48K | +$42K | +$24-54K |
| $1M | $12M | $348K | +$60-96K | +$84K | +$48-108K |
| $5M | $60M | $1.74M | +$300-480K | +$420K | +$240-540K |
The Migration Playbook
Phase 1 — Discovery (Weeks 1-2):
- Per-plan + per-pricing-tier audit
- Per-subscription customer audit (active + paused + canceled)
- Per-invoice + per-payment audit
- Per-coupon + per-discount audit
- Per-tax rate + per-jurisdiction setup
- Custom integrations + webhooks inventory
Phase 2 — Setup (Weeks 3-4):
- Aeion Billing configured (plans, tiers, add-ons, currencies)
- Payment processor integrated (Stripe / Adyen / etc.) — keep existing
- Tax provider integrated (Avalara + alternatives)
- Customer portal configured + branded
- Webhook endpoints migrated
Phase 3 — Subscription Migration (Weeks 5-6):
- Per-active-subscription migration (preserves anniversary date + billing cycle)
- Per-failed-payment in-progress dunning preserved
- Per-coupon + discount continuity
- Per-customer invoice history (last 7 years for audit)
- Per-tax-history preserved
Phase 4 — Parallel Validation (Weeks 7-8):
- New subscriptions in Aeion
- Existing in old system + Aeion (both billing same customer = problem)
- Per-customer migration window — billing transitions on next renewal
- Per-customer historical comparison
Phase 5 — Cutover (Weeks 9-12):
- All renewals in Aeion
- Old system kept read-only for audit
- Stripe Billing / Chargify / Recurly contract canceled
Typical timeline: 8-12 weeks for mid-market SaaS subscription migration.
Key risk: Per-customer billing-cycle continuity is critical. Migration must preserve next-renewal dates, prorations, and dunning sequences. Singularity connectors handle this; manual validation per active subscription before cutover.
Why Replace Stripe Billing / Chargify / Recurly
$36-200K Year-1 savings
Aeion Billing is included free with any Aeion module, replacing the 0.4-0.9% per-transaction markup that Stripe Billing, Chargify, and Recurly all add on top of processing fees.
Processor flexibility
Add Adyen alongside Stripe, or switch entirely, without touching your subscription logic — billing stays put while the payment rail underneath changes.
Native CRM + Commerce integration
A subscription is a customer record, so sales, support, and finance are all looking at the same account instead of three disconnected systems.
Multi-currency + multi-region, out of the box
130+ currencies and per-jurisdiction tax handling ship with the platform, not as a separate integration project.
Native ASC 606 revenue recognition
Deferred-revenue schedules run automatically instead of exporting data to a dedicated rev-rec tool like ChartMogul.
AI dunning + retention
Failed payments trigger personalized recovery sequences and churn-risk scoring, not just a generic smart-retry timer.
Self-service customer portal
Branded, multi-language, and built for customers to manage their own upgrades, downgrades, and invoice history.
Usage-based billing, native
Per-API-call, per-seat, and per-event metering with tiered pricing — the complexity Chargify makes you configure by hand comes standard.