Familya Blog · Subscription

What Happens After You Downgrade?

"Downgrading" in Familya means cancelling your Pro subscription so your family returns to the Free plan. The important thing to know: cancelling does not downgrade you immediately. Here's the actual flow.

1. When you cancel: Pro stays active until the end of the period

When the family head cancels the subscription, its status becomes cancelled, but all Pro benefits keep working until the end of the period you already paid for. As the app says: "The plan will remain active until [date]." You don't lose any access right away.

2. What actually changes: no automatic renewal

  • The subscription does not renew automatically — no further payment is processed.
  • Your Pro benefits keep running until the end of the period you already paid for.
  • To continue, you make a new payment after that period ends.

3. After the period ends: back to the Free plan

When the billing period ends, the system marks the subscription as expired and the family returns to the Free plan — but nothing is locked at that moment. Free plan limits:

  • Storage returns to 100 MB (Pro: 2 GB).
  • Member limit returns to 4 members maximum (Pro: up to 10).
  • Uploads return to 2 MB per image and 5 MB per document (Pro: 5 MB and 10 MB).
  • Notifications and priority support are disabled.

Your family records — assets, liabilities, receivables, and notes — remain stored and accessible. The two things the Free plan cannot carry are excess members and files beyond 100 MB. Neither is touched during the grace period; sections 4 and 5 explain what happens when it ends.

4. After the 14-day grace period: excess members are locked

If the family has more than 4 active members when the subscription expires, the system gives a 14-day grace period before adjusting the member count. After that:

  • The father and one mother (if present) are always kept.
  • Remaining Free slots are filled by the oldest active members.
  • Other members are marked as locked — they can't access their account until the Pro subscription is renewed.

Members are not the only thing that waits for the grace period to end. Files beyond the Free storage limit are locked at the same point in time — that's the next section.

5. After the grace period: files beyond 100 MB are locked

Once the grace period ends and the family is on the Free plan, the files that go beyond the 100 MB storage limit are locked. Locked means exactly that: those files can no longer be opened or downloaded one by one, and the app shows them as a grey tile with a lock icon. Nothing is deleted at that moment — locking is not deleting.

Locked files are deleted 30 days after they are locked — 180 days if the family is dormant — and only then. Every active member gets an email 14 days before the deletion, again 7 days before, and once more after the files are deleted. After the deletion, the rest of your family data is unchanged, and uploading works again up to the Free limit.

While at least one file is locked, the family head can still download all of the family's files — locked and unlocked — from the app as ZIP files, in parts of about 200 MB. This is a rescue, not a fix: downloading does not unlock anything and does not stop the deletion.

One thing is never locked: your identity images — the account avatar, the family photo, and each member's photo. They are not counted against the 100 MB either, so they stay visible even while other files are locked.

6. Resubscribing to Pro: everything is restored automatically

When the family subscribes to Pro again, all locked members are automatically restored to active status. Locked files unlock the same way, and the deletion clock resets — nothing is scheduled for deletion while the subscription is active. No need to re-invite anyone or reconfigure anything — your data and members come back just as they were.

Summary

  • Cancelling ≠ losing access right away — Pro stays active until the end of the period.
  • Cancelling just means not renewing, and your Pro benefits keep running to the end of the period.
  • After the period ends, the family returns to the Free plan (100 MB, max 4 members), and nothing is locked during the 14-day grace period.
  • Excess members are locked after a 14-day grace period, and automatically restored when you resubscribe to Pro.
  • Files beyond 100 MB are locked after the grace period, and only deleted 30 days later (180 days if the family is dormant).
  • While any file is locked, the family head can download every family file as ZIPs from the app, and resubscribing to Pro unlocks all of them.