Downgrade and pause options presented before final cancel

The FTC Click-to-Cancel Rule (2024) permits retention offers during the cancellation flow only if they do not add mandatory friction — the consumer must be able to skip any retention step and complete cancellation without taking additional required actions. Absent retention alternatives (downgrade, pause), the application misses a business opportunity to retain users who would have accepted a lighter-weight option. Stripe's pause_collection API makes subscription pausing a low-effort implementation. Presenting alternatives also demonstrates good faith in regulatory context: a structured, skippable retention flow is evidence of intent to honor cancellation, which reduces FTC enforcement risk.

Add a skippable alternatives step before the cancellation confirmation. The step must have a clearly labeled bypass. In components/CancelFlow.tsx:

if (step === 'alternatives') {
  return (
    <div>
      <h3>Before you go</h3>
      <button type="button" onClick={handleDowngradeToFree}>Switch to the free plan</button>
      <button type="button" onClick={handlePauseSubscription}>Pause for 1–3 months</button>
      {/* Bypass must be clearly labeled and require no additional effort */}
      <button
        type="button"
        className="text-sm text-gray-500 underline mt-4"
        onClick={() => setStep('confirm')}
      >
        No thanks, continue cancelling
      </button>
    </div>
  )
}

For pause, use stripe.subscriptions.update({ pause_collection: { behavior: 'mark_uncollectible' } }) in app/api/subscription/pause/route.ts. The 'continue cancelling' path must complete in the same number of total steps as direct cancellation.