Abandoned payment processor setup with Stripe free trial

[computer-smile]

I'm creating my Stripe free trial experience. Here is what I have so far.

1. When a user signs up for the first time, create a fake local subscription.

 def set_free_trial
  time = 27.days.from_now
  self.set_payment_processor :fake_processor, allow_fake: true
  self.payment_processor.subscribe(trial_ends_at: time, ends_at: time, metadata: {trial: true})
 end

Use this to give them access to features.

2. When they are ready to activate a paid subscription via stripe, present them with a button that redirects to stripe checkout. Based the recommended strategy here https://github.com/pay-rails/pay/blob/master/docs/stripe/1_overview.md#how-to-use-stripe-checkout-with-pay

# app/views/settings.html.erb
<%= button_to "Set up #{plan.capitalize} subscription",checkout_path %>


# app/controllers/checkout

  def checkout
   # this line will create the stripe payment processor and set it as the default. https://github.com/pay-rails/pay/blob/d55823bf5a746b5a71240ba7f6d813cf9b712ede/lib/pay/attributes.rb#L32
    current_user.set_payment_processor :stripe

    @checkout_session = current_user.payment_processor.checkout(
      mode: "subscription",
      line_items: "price_87wuw....."
      )
      redirect_to @checkout_session.url, allow_other_host: true, status: :see_other
  end

Just clicking the button from app/views/settings.html.erb creates the stripe payment processor and makes it the default.

3. I then listen for the stripe.customer.subscription.created webhook to cancel the trial Pay::Subscription created when the user signs up.
4. So after completing checkout the user has:

• 1 cancelled Pay::Subscription that was created for the trial
• 1 default: false Pay::Customer with fake_processor created for the trial
• 1 active Pay::Subscription to use moving forward
• 1 default:true Pay::Customer to be used moving forward

This feels ok as a strategy for free trials with Stripe. It's loosely recommended here #563 (comment). #563

2 questions:

1. Has anyone found a better strategy they like? Possible I may be misunderstanding some of the Pay architecture.

2. If a user abandons checkout in step 2 a Pay:Customer will have been created just from clicking my button in app/views/settings.html.erb via current_user.set_payment_processor :stripe. So, when they abandon they'll have a new default payment processor (stripe) with no active subscription. And the fake trial and its helper methods will no longer work. So they can get themselves in trouble.

Is this the wrong approach? Did I misunderstand the docs for this action/flow?

Thanks for taking a look. Any recommendation or insight is welcome.

[kjf]

@computer-smile Curious to know if you found a flow that works for you?