Cannot Delete Customer with Cancelled Subscription

Retired Boards Appdev Subscriptions

Topic summary

Issue: Stores cannot delete customers that have or previously had subscription contracts, even after canceling/removing subscriptions and orders. CMS shows an “Active subscription” block, while GraphQL reports “Existing subscription contracts.”

Platform update/position:

  • Deletion is currently blocked by design if any subscription contracts exist(ed).
  • Alternative: use “Erase personal data” (GDPR). Processing may take ~10 days. A screenshot shows where to access it in the customer profile menu.
  • The GUI error wording (“Active”) is a known bug; language will be aligned to “Existing.”

Feedback and impact:

  • Merchants testing in production report being unable to clear test customers, affecting stats and data hygiene.
  • Some report no active subscriptions (e.g., via Recharge) yet deletion remains blocked; “deleted” subscriptions may still appear in order histories.

Webhooks guidance:

  • For failing webhooks, return HTTP 200 quickly to stop retries and handle processing asynchronously (per Shopify webhook best practices).

Latest stance and status:

  • Deleting customers will not be an option; only data erasure is available.
  • Discussion about enabling deletion continues internally, but no ETA or resolution. Open issues remain around cleaning up test data and removing lingering subscription artifacts.
Summarized with AI on December 25. AI used: gpt-5.
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Update from DM:

  1. Not being able to delete customers with an existing subscription is actually by design as of right now. We have “Erase Personal Data” button, screenshot, that can be used for GDPR compliance.

  2. We have an error message that pops up when trying to delete a customer from the GUI stating you cannot delete a customer because of an “Active” subscription, which is incorrect. Our GraphQL error states that you cannot delete a customer because of an “Existing” subscription, which is correct. So we need to sync up the language and that’s a bug I am working on fixing at them moment.

  3. There’s still ongoing discussions around the ability to delete a customer with an existing subscription. It’s caused confusion on multiple occasions and each occasion raises its priority. So thank you for creating this forum post and being so patient with me!