This article explains what actually happens to your AutoSPF account and your email deliverability if a trial plan is not converted to a paid subscription before the trial end date.
The Short Answer
Missing the trial payment deadline does not cause an immediate disruption to your email delivery. AutoSPF provides a 30-day grace period before any DNS changes are made.
What Happens Immediately on Non-Payment
When a trial ends without a payment method on file or with a declined card, the following happens right away:
- Your account is moved to suspended status
- Access to AutoSPF features is disabled — domain limits are set to zero, and SPF flattening, audit logs, Teams, and SSO are all turned off in the UI
- Your DNS records are not changed — your flattened SPF record continues to be served as-is, so your email delivery continues normally
- However, your SPF records will stop being updated if your underlying email service includes change during this period
You will receive an immediate email notification informing you that SPF record updates have been paused and providing a link to add a payment method.
The 30-Day Grace Period
After the trial expires without payment, you have 30 days to add a payment method and reactivate your account. During this time:
- Your existing flattened SPF records continue to be served (but not updated)
- Reminder emails are sent automatically at 5, 2, and 1 days before the grace period ends, and again at 1, 2, and 5 days after it lapses
If You Pay Within the 30-Day Grace Period
Your account is restored immediately upon successful payment:
- Your plan features and domain limits are reinstated
- SPF flattening resumes and your records are pushed back to DNS immediately
If the 30-Day Grace Period Lapses Without Payment
After 30 days with no payment, AutoSPF stops flattening your record as follows:
We never modify your own DNS records Your domain's SPF record still points to AutoSPF the same way it always has — via the `include` or `redirect` entry you set up when you onboarded, whether you're using standard flattening or our macro-based (dynamic) flattening. What changes is the *content* of the record that entry points to.
While your subscription is active, that record keeps your SPF policy fully optimized — either through pre-resolved, flattened IP addresses (standard flattening), or through live, query-time lookups (macro flattening) — so mail servers never hit the 10-lookup limit SPF enforces.
If your account becomes suspended for non-payment and isn't resolved before the grace period ends, we stop maintaining that optimized version — for either flattening method.
Instead, the record we control reverts to a plain, un-flattened rebuild of your current SPF setup exactly as it appears in your AutoSPF dashboard — the same `include`/`ip4` entries you've configured, just no longer pre-resolved or dynamically evaluated.
If that combined list exceeds the 10-lookup limit (which is usually the reason you needed AutoSPF in the first place), mail servers may start failing SPF checks for your domain depending on where in your SPF record the sending server is located.
In short: your DNS setup doesn't change — only the content behind the record it points to does, switching from "optimized and safe" to "unflattened and potentially over the limit," regardless of which flattening method your domain uses.
For additional information or help re-activating your account, please contact us.