Organization Memberships
Corbis organizations let one admin buy a team subscription, invite users by email, and manage access from a single billing account.
This guide explains what happens when a team is created, how seats are counted, and what happens if an invited user already has a personal subscription.
If you want current plan details, see Plans & Pricing.
At a Glance
For Organization Admins
The organization admin is the billing owner for the team subscription.
In practice, that means the admin can:
- create the organization
- start and manage billing
- change the plan
- change the seat count
- invite or remove members
There are two important gating rules in the live code:
- an organization must have an active subscription before invites can be sent
- organization usage is blocked when the org is not in an eligible billing state
How seats are counted
Corbis treats these as occupied seats:
- the admin account
- every active member
- every pending invite that has not expired yet
This means sending an invite immediately reserves space for that person, even before they accept.
How invites behave
Invites are sent by email and expire after 7 days.
If an invite is not accepted in time:
- it stops holding a seat once it expires
- it no longer appears as a valid invitation
- the admin can send a fresh invite
For Invited Users
To accept an organization invite successfully, the current code requires all of the following:
- you are signed in
- your email is verified
- your signed-in email matches the invited email address
- the invite is still active and not expired
- the organization subscription is active
If any of those checks fail, the invite cannot be accepted.
If you do not have a paid personal subscription
This path is simple:
- You open the invite.
- You confirm the join.
- Corbis activates your organization membership.
- Your account gets organization-based access.
If you already have a paid personal subscription
Corbis handles this as a transition, not as an instant replacement.
Before joining, Corbis shows a confirmation step explaining that:
- your personal subscription will be scheduled to end at the end of its current billing period
- your access level during the overlap may come from either your personal plan or the organization plan
- your personal balance is frozen so it can potentially be restored if team access ends early
Corbis does not cancel the personal subscription immediately.
Personal Plan to Organization Plan Transition
This is the most nuanced part of organization billing, and it is now handled explicitly in the code.
What happens at acceptance time
When a paid personal user accepts an organization invite:
- Corbis accepts the team membership
- Corbis snapshots the user’s personal usage state
- Corbis schedules the personal subscription to cancel at period end
- Corbis records a transition state so the system can finish or restore the handoff correctly later
The personal snapshot includes:
- remaining personal credits
- the personal reset date
- workflow usage state
What access does the user get during the overlap?
Until the personal subscription actually ends, the user keeps the higher tier of:
- the personal subscription tier
- the organization tier
That means:
- if the personal tier is higher, the user keeps that higher tier until the personal period ends
- if the organization tier is higher, the organization tier can take effect right away
- if both tiers are the same, access stays the same while billing shifts over time
What happens after the personal subscription ends?
Once the personal billing period ends, the user continues on the organization tier only.
What happens if the organization access ends before then?
If the user loses organization access before the original personal billing period would have ended, Corbis attempts to restore the frozen personal state.
That restore path is designed to preserve the value of a personal plan that had already been paid for.
Billing, Access, and Usage
In Corbis, these are related, but they are not always the same thing.
For most organization members:
- billing is organization-based
- effective access is the organization tier
- usage comes from the organization pool
For users in the personal-to-organization overlap window:
- billing and effective access may not match yet
- the user may still show personal billing metadata while already holding organization membership
- Corbis uses the higher tier during the overlap on purpose
If Billing Changes or Access Ends
If the organization is waiting on payment
The organization does not become usable until billing is active. Corbis fails closed here, which means pending-payment organizations do not get team access until payment is confirmed.
If the organization becomes past due
If an active organization later has a payment failure, Corbis allows a short grace window while payment is retried. In the current implementation, that grace period is up to 7 days.
If the organization is cancelled mid-cycle
If the organization is cancelled but still has paid time remaining, members keep access through the paid-through date. Corbis then removes organization access after that grace window ends.
If an admin removes a member
When a member is removed:
- the organization membership is removed
- organization-tier access tied to that membership is turned off
- if the user joined from a paid personal plan and there is still restorable personal time left, Corbis attempts to restore that personal state
Multi-Organization Membership
Yes, a user can belong to more than one organization.
The code supports a preferred active organization so the app can decide which organization context to use for organization-based billing and usage.
If you belong to multiple organizations, it is worth checking which one is active before doing work that should count against team usage.
Common Questions
Does the admin use a seat?
Yes. The admin is stored as an active organization member and counts toward the seat total.
Do pending invites take up seats?
Yes. A non-expired pending invite reserves a seat until it is accepted, removed, or expires.
Can I accept an invite with a different email than the one that was invited?
No. The acceptance flow checks the invited email address directly.
No. If you already have a paid personal plan, Corbis schedules it to cancel at the end of the current billing period.
What if my personal plan is better than the organization plan?
You keep the higher personal tier until the personal billing period ends. After that, you continue on the organization tier.
What if the organization removes me before my personal billing period would have ended?
Corbis attempts to restore the frozen personal state from when you joined the organization.
Best Practices
For admins:
- confirm the organization subscription is active before inviting people
- remember that pending invites reserve seats
- clean up or resend stale invites after they expire
- warn users in advance if joining the team will replace a personal paid plan at renewal
For invited users:
- sign in with the exact email that was invited
- verify your email first
- read the confirmation step carefully if you already have a personal subscription
- if you belong to multiple teams, confirm which organization is active before doing team-billed work
