Visa Gives Banks Tools to Turn Subscription Chaos Into Loyalty

The modern consumer economy increasingly runs on autopay. From streaming services and cloud storage to artificial intelligence tools and fitness apps, subscriptions have become ubiquitous in the background of everyday financial life.

And as the global total races toward a projected 12 billion subscriptions by 2030, the friction isn’t just financial; it’s becoming cognitive. Consumers are increasingly paying for things they can’t easily see, track or stop. For financial institutions, this presents a paradox: recurring payments can deepen card usage, but they also may introduce confusion, disputes and customer dissatisfaction.

Visa believes this tension calls for better visibility and consumer control, on Thursday (March 26), unveiling its Enhanced Subscription Manager, a new service embedded within its Digital Issuer Solutions platform that is designed to give consumers a unified, in-app way to view, manage, switch and cancel recurring payments.

“I think of this as a relationship-keeping feature for issuers,” said Jeffrey Chen, VP of Digital Issuer Solutions Portfolio at Visa. “When customers can see, manage, stop, restart all of their subscriptions in the bank’s app, it just makes the issuer a more core part of what a consumer needs to better manage their financial health.”

Solving for the Hidden Cost of Frictionless Payments

Subscriptions are not a new phenomenon, but their scale and diversity have changed dramatically in recent years. Consumers now routinely manage dozens of recurring charges across categories that didn’t exist a decade ago, from productivity software to generative AI tools.

It sounds great, until it isn’t. Consumers can often struggle to answer basic questions like, “What subscriptions am I paying for? When do they renew? How do I cancel them?”

These questions reveal a deeper issue. The infrastructure of recurring payments has evolved faster than the tools available to manage it.

“Customers will call you if they see a subscription that they don’t recognize,” Chen said. “Customers will file a dispute if they don’t recognize that transaction as well. And all of those don’t just erode the issuer’s trusted relationship with the consumer, they also create costs.”

Visa’s approach is to shift those interactions upstream before confusion turns into friction. By centralizing subscription data within a bank’s app, the company aims to give consumers a real-time, actionable view of their recurring spending.

The Enhanced Subscription Manager service model hinges on three core capabilities: aggregation, transparency and control. Users can see all their subscriptions in one place, receive notifications about upcoming charges, and take actions such as canceling or modifying payment methods, all without leaving the app.

“It’s a win-win for both parties,” Chen said, highlighting that the value for consumers is clarity and control; while for issuers, the payoff is deeper engagement and reduced operational strain.

Redefining Top of Wallet

One feature of the Enhanced Subscription Manager that could have outsized strategic implications is card switching, or the ability to move subscriptions from one payment method to another. On its face, card switching is a convenience tool. In practice, it can be a mechanism for capturing recurring spend.

The functionality effectively allows issuers to compete not just for transactions, but for entire categories of recurring spend. If a bank can make it easier to consolidate subscriptions onto its card, it can gain a steady stream of high-frequency, predictable transactions.

“Consumers don’t just want to see subscriptions on one card — they want the ability to actually centralize [it in one hub],” Chen said.

And while subscription overload affects all consumers, it is particularly acute among younger demographics. Millennials and Gen Z users are deeply embedded in subscription ecosystems and more sensitive to fragmentation and lack of transparency.

“I think this is a problem for all generations, but especially for millennials and Gen Z,” Chen said. “For an issuer to be able to address those needs holistically, it gives them a greater opportunity to be more relevant.”

The emphasis on relevance underscores a broader shift. Banking apps are evolving into financial control centers, expected to provide not just access to funds but insight, organization and proactive management.

“Our goal is to ultimately be the go-to partner for issuers whenever they’re trying to deliver any great digital experience for consumers,” Chen said.