Order Phases

Split one contract into sequential phases, each with its own plan, pricing, billing frequency, and payment terms

Overview

A phase is a slice of a contract with its own dates and its own commercial terms. Phases run back to back, so a customer can move from one plan, price, or billing cadence to the next without a second order, a second signature, or a second checkout.

Use phases when a deal has distinct stages, for example:

• A free or discounted trial period that converts to a paid subscription.
• An implementation or services period followed by a recurring subscription.
• A ramp-up on a smaller plan before moving to the full plan.
• A multi-year contract where each year is billed on a different cadence or at a different price.

Every order has at least one phase. A standard order is simply a one-phase order, and it looks and behaves exactly as it always has. Phases only appear in Salesbricks once an order has two or more.

If you don’t see a Phases section in the order builder, multi-phase orders aren’t enabled for your account yet. Reach out to us in your dedicated Slack channel.

Phases compared to ramping and upgrades

Use	When to reach for it
Ramping	The plan and terms stay the same, but line item quantities or rates step up over the contract.
Phases	The plan, bricks, billing frequency, payment terms, or discounts change at a set date, and you want everything captured in one order form.
Upgrade	The customer’s needs change after the order has closed. An upgrade is a separate order layered on top of the current one.

How phases work

Each phase owns its own schedule and selection. A few settings stay at the order level and are set on Phase 1.

Set per phase	Set once per order (on Phase 1)
Contract period and end date	Start date
Billing frequency	Currency
Payment terms	Pricing display
Product, plan, bricks, and quantities	First charge or invoice date
Usage pools	Terms and conditions, commercial terms
Discounts: sales, one-time, duration, coupons, and contract discounts	Renewal type and renewal contract period
Ramping and custom billing

Rules that always hold:

• Phases are contiguous. Each phase starts the day after the previous phase ends. There are no gaps and no overlaps, and you can’t reorder phases.
• The order ends when the last phase ends. The order’s contract period is the sum of its phases.
• Each phase is priced on its own length. A 6 month phase is priced at monthly rates even when it sits inside a 24 month contract, because the phase, not the order, decides whether annual pricing applies.
• Phase names are optional. Unnamed phases display as “Phase 1”, “Phase 2”, and so on. Names can be up to 50 characters.

Building a multi-phase order

1. Build Phase 1

   Start a new order as usual. Under Phases, the first phase is the order you already know how to build: set its contract period, billing frequency, payment terms, product, plan, and bricks. See Building an Order for each field.

   The Add phase button only appears once the last phase has an end date, so set the contract period first.

2. Add a phase

   Click Add phase. Salesbricks appends a blank phase that starts the day after the previous phase ends. It defaults to a 12 month contract period billed annually. Nothing else carries over, so the new phase starts with no product, plan, or bricks selected.

3. Configure the new phase

   Expand the phase and fill it in the same way as Phase 1:

   • Contract period: pick a number of months, or choose Custom end date to end the phase on a specific day. The start date is read-only and shows Continues from previous phase.
   • Billing frequency: the options offered depend on the phase’s length. A 3 month phase can’t be billed annually.
   • Payment terms: each phase has its own.
   • Product, plan, and bricks: each phase can sell a different plan, or the same plan with different bricks and quantities.
   • Discounts: click Add discount to apply sales, one-time, duration, or coupon discounts to this phase only.

   Changing an earlier phase’s end date shifts every later phase forward by the same amount, so each phase keeps its length.

4. Rename, duplicate, or remove phases

   Open the menu on any phase’s header:

   • Rename phase gives the phase a label your customer will see on the order form, for example “Pilot” or “Year 2”.
   • Duplicate phase appends a copy at the end of the order with the same product, plan, bricks, discounts, and custom billing schedule, on a fresh 12 month span. Duration discounts and ramping windows aren’t copied, since they’re tied to the original phase’s dates.
   • Remove phase deletes the phase. Phase 1 can’t be removed.
5. Review and save

   The Phases heading shows a running summary, for example “2 phases · 18 months total”, and a callout confirms the phases are contiguous with no gaps or overlaps. Each phase header shows its date range, length, and phase total.

   Save the order and share it as you normally would.

On a trial order, Phase 1 carries a Trial badge. Set Phase 1 to the trial plan at no charge and Phase 2 to the paid plan, and the customer signs once for both.

What your customer sees

On a multi-phase order, the order form groups everything by phase. Under “Products and services”, a line explains that each phase is self-contained, and then each phase gets:

• A header with the phase number and name, and the phase’s date range.
• Its own Contract period, Billing frequency, and Payment terms.
• Its own line items, usage commitments, and one-time charges.
• A Phase N summary box with the subtotal, any duration or contract discounts, and the Phase total.

The billing schedule on the order form is grouped by phase as well.

During checkout, the pricing breakdown shows one card per phase with that phase’s total and billing cadence. When Phase 1 is free, the order summary adds a callout such as “Pricing changes on Jul 15, 2026” so the customer knows when the paid phase begins.

Billing and invoicing

Each phase generates its own invoices from its own billing frequency and payment terms:

• Billing periods never cross a phase boundary. The first invoice of a phase falls on that phase’s start date, whatever the previous phase’s cadence was.
• Payment terms are per invoice. Two invoices on the same order can carry different Net terms if their phases differ.
• A custom end date creates a partial period. If a phase ends partway through a billing period, the final period of that phase is billed as a partial period according to your team’s partial period setting.

After the order closes, phases appear across billing:

Surface	What you see
Order details	A Phases card with one entry per phase, showing its plan, date range, billing frequency, payment terms, and a status of Upcoming, Active, Completed, Terminating, or Terminated. Order-level billing frequency and payment terms read Varies by phase.
Billing table	The phase name under each invoice number.
Billing statement	A Phase row in the invoice summary.
Billing schedule editor	One tab per phase. The header reports All phases balanced or how many phases are unbalanced when custom billing amounts don’t match the phase total.

Discounts and coupons

Every discount belongs to a phase:

• Sales, one-time, and contract discounts apply to the phase they’re added to. If a phase’s discount expires or its minimum spend isn’t met, that phase loses its discounts while the other phases keep theirs.
• Duration discounts are measured from the phase’s start date.
• Coupons are redeemed per phase. Applying a coupon to two phases counts as two uses against the coupon’s usage limit.
• Apply on renewal is only offered on the last phase, since the renewal is based on the last phase.

Duration discount date ranges are validated against the whole contract, not the phase they belong to. Two duration discounts on different phases can’t cover the same dates.

Upgrades, renewals, and recasts

Upgrades

An upgrade inherits every phase from the current contract, so the customer’s timeline stays intact. In the upgrade builder:

• Add phase and Remove phase aren’t available.
• Each phase’s end date and billing frequency are read-only. You can move a phase’s start date, but only within that phase’s original date range.
• Bricks and quantities can be added per phase. Quantities can’t be reduced.
• Contract-wide and one-time discounts from the base order are cleared on each phase of the upgrade, so re-add any that should carry over.

Renewals

A renewal is built from the last phase only. It inherits the last phase’s plan, bricks, ramping, billing frequency, payment terms, and length. A contract with a 12 month ramp phase followed by a 24 month steady phase renews as a 24 month order at the steady phase’s terms.

You can add phases to a renewal while building it, so a renewal can itself become a multi-phase order.

Recasts

A recast also starts from the last phase’s bricks. Rebuild the phases you need before sharing the recast.

Reports, subscription management, and CRM

• Orders list: multi-phase orders carry an “N phases” badge, and each row expands to show one line per phase with its dates and contract value.
• MRR report and CSV export: a Phase column appears after Brick. A brick sold in more than one phase reports under its earliest phase.
• Subscription page: the entitlements card shows which phase is current. Usage bricks get one tab per phase they were sold in, and usage can only be recorded for dates inside a phase that includes that brick.
• Milestones: grouped by phase on the customer page.
• CRM field mapping: three phase fields become available for mapping when multi-phase orders are enabled. At the order level, phase_count and phase_summary (one line per phase with its name, dates, and total). At the line item level, phase_index. HubSpot receives one line item per brick per phase, with the phase name and dates appended to the line item description.

Limitations

• Pausing isn’t supported. A multi-phase subscription can’t be paused. The Pause action is disabled with the message “Pausing multi-phase subscriptions is not yet supported. Please contact support for assistance.”
• Phases can’t be reordered. Remove and re-add a phase to change the sequence.
• Duration discounts are validated across the whole contract. See Discounts and coupons.

API

Subscriptions created through the REST API can include a phases array on the following endpoints:

Subscriptions

• Create a subscription
• Retrieve a susbcription
• Update a subscription
• Estimate a subscription

Subscription State

• List all subscription bricks
• Retrieve current subscription state
• Update details for a closed subscription

Subscription Recasts

• Create a subscription recast
• Update a subscription recast
• Estimate a subscription recast

Subscription Upgrades

• Create a subscription upgrade
• Update a subscription upgrade
• Estimate a subscription upgrade

When phases is present, the phases own the timeline, billing frequency, and bricks. The order-level starts_at, contract_length, billing_frequency, and bricks become optional and are derived from the phases when omitted.

Phase fields

Field	Required	Notes
phase_position	Yes	0-based. Positions must be unique and contiguous, and each must equal its index in the array.
bricks	Yes	The bricks in this phase. Every phase needs at least one.
contract_length	Create, estimate, recast	Whole months. Not accepted on upgrades, which inherit each phase’s end date.
billing_frequency	Create, estimate, recast	MONTHLY, QUARTERLY, SEMI_ANNUALLY, ANNUALLY, or ALL_UPFRONT. Inherited on upgrades.
starts_at	No	Phase 0 defaults to the order-level starts_at. Later phases derive from the previous phase’s end date plus one day. Sending a date that leaves a gap or overlap returns 400.
plan_id	No	Lets a phase sell a different plan. Defaults to the order-level plan_id. A payload with no plan at either level returns 400.
payment_terms	No	Days until due. Defaults to the order-level value.
discount_coupons	No	Coupon codes for this phase. Only the first is applied. On a multi-phase payload, coupons must be set per phase rather than at the order level.

Upgrades send only the phases being changed. Each phase_position must match a phase on the current contract, and omitted positions are inherited unchanged.

Sending phases when multi-phase orders aren’t enabled for your account returns 400 with the message “Multi-phase orders are not enabled.”

Example: estimate a two-phase subscription

A 6 month pilot on a Starter plan billed monthly, followed by 12 months on a Growth plan billed annually.

cURL

curl -X POST https://api.salesbricks.com/api/v2/subscriptions/estimate \
  -H "X-SALESBRICKS-KEY: <your-api-key>" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "starts_at": "2026-10-01",
    "phases": [
      {
        "phase_position": 0,
        "contract_length": 6,
        "billing_frequency": "MONTHLY",
        "plan_id": "p9q0r1s2-0d44-4b50-8888-8dd25736052a",
        "bricks": [
          { "brick_id": "b3c4d5e6-0d44-4b50-8888-8dd25736052a", "quantity": 10 }
        ]
      },
      {
        "phase_position": 1,
        "contract_length": 12,
        "billing_frequency": "ANNUALLY",
        "plan_id": "g7h8i9j0-0d44-4b50-8888-8dd25736052a",
        "bricks": [
          { "brick_id": "c4d5e6f7-0d44-4b50-8888-8dd25736052a", "quantity": 25 }
        ]
      }
    ]
  }'

JSON (truncated)

{
  "starts_at": "2026-10-01",
  "ends_at": "2028-03-31",
  "grand_total": 4200000,
  "phases": [
    {
      "phase_position": 0,
      "starts_at": "2026-10-01",
      "ends_at": "2027-03-31",
      "billing_frequency": "MONTHLY",
      "payment_terms": 30,
      "sub_total": 600000,
      "grand_total": 600000,
      "line_items": ["..."],
      "billing_schedule": ["..."]
    },
    {
      "phase_position": 1,
      "starts_at": "2027-04-01",
      "ends_at": "2028-03-31",
      "billing_frequency": "ANNUALLY",
      "payment_terms": 30,
      "sub_total": 3600000,
      "grand_total": 3600000,
      "line_items": ["..."],
      "billing_schedule": ["..."]
    }
  ]
}

Reading phases back

Retrieve a subscription and Retrieve current subscription state include a phases array only when the order has more than one phase. Each entry carries phase_position, starts_at, ends_at, billing_frequency, payment_terms, sub_total, grand_total, line_items, and that phase’s billing_schedule. When phases is absent, the order has a single phase and the order-level fields describe it.

Phase input takes contract_length, while output reports ends_at. To edit a phase you read back, convert the end date to whole months from the phase’s start.

In the GraphQL API, every order exposes a phases list and each order brick carries a phasePosition. Briq and the Salesbricks MCP server also accept phases when drafting orders.