Lifetime subscription gone
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This app has been out for years now and several years ago there was an option to pay for a lifetime subscription. I paid that back in 2018 or 2019. Now my account has been reverted to a free account so I’ve lost all my lifetime benefits. If anything I should have been grandfathered in to whatever set up you have now.
I haven’t been on in a while but everything has been reset except the podcasts I have subscribed to. All my hours listened and downloaded episodes are gone. What can be done since I paid the lifetime fee years ago even if you don’t offer that to new subscribers now?
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Thanks for the details, and sorry about the frustration here.
To clarify how lifetime access has always worked: what’s called Pocket Casts Champion status (lifetime access to Plus features) was only granted to customers who purchased the web or desktop app before September 18, 2019, since that was a one-time purchase at the time. If your original purchase was through the Google Play Store or Apple App Store for the mobile app, that was a separate one-time purchase for the mobile app itself (around $4.99), and it never carried lifetime Plus access. Mobile apps became free for everyone in 2019, so any mobile features you paid for back then have simply remained free ever since, nothing was taken from you there.
More detail on how this works is here: Lifetime Access to Pocket Casts Plus
Separately, losing your listening history and downloads is unusual and not something that happens when reverting to a free account. That’s worth investigating on its own.
I see that you have also emailed us regarding this issue. I have responded to that email thread to get more details.
Pocket Casts Forum 