Launch Stripe billing lifecycle

Problem

Dataface has no billing system. Users cannot sign up for a paid plan, manage subscriptions, or have their access gated by payment status. The Stripe integration needs to cover the full lifecycle: product/price catalog matching the approved pricing model, checkout flow for new subscriptions, webhook-driven state sync so the Dataface Cloud app knows a user's plan status in real time, and handling of upgrades, downgrades, cancellations, and failed payments. Without this, there is no revenue path and the product cannot launch publicly.

Context

• A real paid launch requires more than checkout; the full Stripe lifecycle has to cover products/prices, subscription state, entitlements, failure handling, and operator visibility.
• This work crosses product, billing, and support boundaries, so the contract between Stripe state and Dataface account access needs to be explicit before coding too much behavior.
• The safest first release is likely a constrained lifecycle with clear manual/operator escapes rather than trying to automate every billing edge case immediately.

Possible Solutions

• A - Implement only basic checkout and patch the rest later: fast to start, but it leaves major account-state and support gaps.
• B - Recommended: design and implement a constrained full billing lifecycle: define the Stripe objects, entitlement mapping, failure states, webhook handling, and operator support path required for launch.
• C - Avoid Stripe and handle paid access manually: low engineering cost now, but not credible for the intended launch.

Plan

1. Define the supported billing lifecycle states and how each one maps to product access, account messaging, and operator visibility.
2. Design the Stripe integration model, including product/price setup, webhook/event handling, idempotency, and failure or retry behavior.
3. Implement the minimum launchable lifecycle with explicit support/runbook coverage for edge cases that remain partly manual.
4. Add focused tests and operational checks around the critical state transitions so billing regressions do not slip through silently.

Implementation Progress

• Confirm scope and acceptance with milestone owner.

• Milestone readiness signal is updated.

• Track blockers and mitigation owner.

Review Feedback

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