Share via

Keep your Microsoft business billing account active

If a billing account is unused for a certain amount of time, it's classified as inactive. An inactive billing account can increase potential security risks to that account and the resources it contains. To reduce this risk, Microsoft takes measures to secure, protect, and ultimately delete inactive billing accounts, tenants, and subscriptions within them.

This article applies to the following agreements:

  • Microsoft Customer Agreement (MCA)
  • Microsoft Online Subscription Agreement (MOSA)
  • Cloud Solution Provider (CSP)
  • Enrollment for Education Solutions (EES)

What is an inactive billing account?

A billing account is considered inactive when the following criteria are met in a minimum of a 12-month period:

  • No usage within the billing account, tenant, or subscription
  • No sign-in activity within the billing account, tenant, or subscription
  • No open or pending support requests

When a billing account meets all these criteria, you receive a notification from Microsoft that says that your inactive billing account will be blocked in 30 days.

Important

If your billing account remains inactive for 30 days after the notification, we block it.

How do I keep my billing account active?

If you use your billing account within 30 days of receiving the notification, your account returns to its active state and is no longer subject to getting blocked. The following list includes examples of activities and account usage that keep your billing account active:

  • Using a product or a service
  • Generating metered usage
  • Creating a support ticket

What happens if my billing account is blocked?

When your billing account is blocked, you can no longer perform certain actions, like adding new subscriptions and transferring existing subscriptions. To unblock your billing account and return it to its active state, use the following criteria to contact support for help:

  • If you bought your subscription directly from Microsoft, contact Microsoft Support.
  • If you're a Partner or Enterprise customer, contact your partner or account manager.

If you have a billing account with a prepaid subscription set to auto-renew: After your billing account is blocked, if no action is taken, you receive a notification of tenant deauthorization. This step can be avoided or reversed within the allowed timeframe specified in the notification. Subscription usage isn't affected until a lifecycle management event occurs, like when a payment method expires. At that time, subscriptions might expire and be deleted, followed by billing account expiration and deletion.

All other customers: After your billing account is blocked, if no action is taken, subscription suspension, tenant deauthorization, and account termination might occur. Before each step is implemented, you receive a notification that contains the details and timeframe for that specific step. Each step can be avoided or reversed within the allowed time by contacting the support channels listed in this section.

Warning

You can avoid account termination, but after it occurs, it's not reversible. If no action is taken within the notification period, your billing account is terminated, and any data and resources associated with the billing account are permanently deleted and can't be recovered.

Related content

Understand your Microsoft business billing account (article)
Manage your Microsoft business billing profiles (article)
Get support for Microsoft 365 for business (article)