Help Center

Failed payments

A failed charge stops calls straight away, but your phone number is held for 30 days. Paying any time in that window puts everything back exactly as it was.

What happens, and when

When	What happens
Immediately	New calls stop being answered. You get an email, and a banner appears on your dashboard.
Day 1–29	Your number is held for you. Your dashboard, call history, contacts, settings and knowledge base are all fully accessible.
Day 23	A warning email — seven days before your number is released.
Day 30	If it's still unpaid, your number is released and becomes available to other businesses.

Why calls stop immediately

There's no grace period on call service, and that's a deliberate choice rather than an oversight. Every call costs real money to handle whether or not the account behind it is paid up, so continuing to answer on an unpaid account isn't something that can be quietly absorbed.

Callers hear a short, polite message — not dead air, and nothing that explains your billing situation to your customers.

Why your number is held for 30 days

A phone number is the one thing here that genuinely can't be undone. Once released, it goes back into general availability and someone else can claim it — we can't get it back for you, and with direct mode in particular that means customers holding your number can no longer reach you at all.

So the number is parked. Pay at any point in those 30 days and you keep the same number — nothing is reprovisioned, and if you forward an existing line, your forwarding keeps working untouched.

The day-23 email is the one to act on

It arrives seven days before release, specifically so there's time to sort a card out. After day 30 the number is gone and a new one means new signage, new listings, and redoing forwarding.

Fixing it

1Open Billing from the sidebar.
2Update the card on file, or add a new one.
3The outstanding charge is retried. Once it goes through, your agent starts answering again.

Nothing is lost while you're blocked. Your settings, services, knowledge base, contacts, call history and appointments are all exactly as you left them — only the answering stops.

Common reasons a charge fails

The card expired — the most common one by a distance.
The card was replaced after being lost or reissued, and the old number is on file.
Insufficient funds at the moment we tried.
Your bank blocked it as unusual. Often fixed by approving it in your banking app and retrying.
Your billing address changed and no longer matches the card.

If the very first charge fails

Same shape. If the day-14 charge at the end of your free trial doesn't go through, callers hear a polite message rather than dead air, and your number is held rather than released while you update your payment method. See How trial and usage work.

Calls stopped but you've paid?

Check your dashboard banner first — it says exactly which situation you're in, and a failed payment isn't the only reason calls can stop. The other two are running out of included minutes with overage turned off, and using up your trial minutes before day 14.

If the banner says the payment is resolved and calls still aren't arriving, the problem is more likely to be forwarding — see Turning off Live Voicemail / call screening.