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Lightning Payroll offers both monthly and annual subscriptions. When your subscription expires, the program enters a temporary read-only mode before access is locked.
- 7-day read-only period: You have 7 days of free read-only access after your subscription expires. During this time you can still open the program, view your data, and export reports and payslips. Use this window to save any PDFs or CSVs you need before access is locked.
- After the 7 days: The program can no longer be used without an active subscription. If you only need ongoing read access to your historical data, you can purchase a reduced-cost read-only subscription (available as an annual or monthly plan), which lets you view, print, and export your records but does not allow new edits.
- Your data is safe: No data is deleted when your subscription expires. We strongly recommend keeping regular backups of your records.
To purchase a read-only licence, visit this link.
If your renewal payment is late: if your renewal notice explained it and payment has not been received by the expiry date (for example, your card was declined), your subscription is renewed anyway so you keep full access for 7 days while you arrange payment. If you pay within 6 weeks of the expiry date (4 weeks for a monthly subscription), your new subscription runs from the original expiry date. If payment has still not been received after those 7 days, the 7-day read-only period described above applies and access is then locked until you pay. If payment is not received within the 6 weeks (4 weeks for a monthly subscription), the renewal is cancelled and nothing is owed.
Keep a copy of your database, as financial and payroll records must be retained for at least 7 years under ATO requirements. To create a backup, go to Tools >> Create Backup in the program. For safety, save your backup to cloud storage or a USB device, or email it to yourself or a trusted colleague.
