Subscription Feature Used as "Membership" Recurring Payment?

[delcorsets]

I've been researching the Miva subscription feature and trying to determine if it would add value/benefits to our business.

I've been thinking about a "membership" feature for our clients, and maybe Miva's subscription feature could work as the framework. I'm thinking it might follow the same type of model as Miva's MAP program where a customer would be charged $x. / month but does not receive and actual physical product - rather, the monthly fee would be converted to a credit toward purchases and allow members access to their specific discount levels and promotions.

- Shopper would select and purchase a membership in one of several "tiers" or levels
- Their monthly membership fee would be converted into an account credit
- Their membership would allow them a specific discount percentage based on their subscription level
- Their membership would allow them to access to hidden "members-only" categoires

Using price groups and availability groups it would seem easy enough to provide the appropriate discount level and access to hidden categories, but I'm not sure if Subscriptions has a feature to assign members to these price groups/availability groups, and to convert customer payments directly into an account credit?

Is anyone doing anything similar to this, or know if this possible with the Subscription feature? ..or is this a Dream Feature?

[PCINET - Andreas]

We wrote some code (no module) to add a percentage of the basket subtotal as a credit to the customer account. So instead of pints they really get some percentage of the purchase back and can use it for future purchases. Adding change of price group depending on purchases shouldn't be hard either. Your idea should work using the subscription module and some coding.