If we downgrade to free, can we upgrade in the future

[helpdesk]

Hello,

Currently paying for a premium subscription. Thinking of temporarily changing to free plan.

What happens when we want to re-upgrade to premium in the future? Will we regain access to all of our documents again (especially critical is advanced roadmaps), exactly as they were before downgrading temporarily to free?

Other comments of things we should consider are welcome.

Thanks, Em

[John Funk]

Hi @helpdesk  - Welcome to the Atlassian Community!

Yes, you can always upgrade again in the future. 

[helpdesk]

Hi John, I understand I can upgrade. But when I upgrade, will all the data be resurrected to the same state that it was before I downgraded?

For example: Today we have a advanced roadmap set up right now, with a lot of sophistication. If I downgrade, I lose access to the advanced roadmap. If I upgrade in the future, will the advanced roadmap set up right now, with the sophistication, be EXACTLY the same as it is today? Alternatively, if I upgraded in the future, maybe I would have to set up the advanced roadmap and all sophistications again?

[John Funk]

Yes, I expect it the data will still be there and available. 

[helpdesk]

Hi John, expecting the data will be unavailable is not sufficient to base a decision on. I need to know definitely what Jira offers and does not offer. Could you confirm with a 100% confident response in writing please, to confirm if data will be there still?

Em

[John Funk]

We are just users like you - whether we say yes or no, you should not base your decision on that. You need to open a support ticket with Atlassian and get their official stance. 

[helpdesk]

Hey John, I am just coming to realize that you & community is user generated helpful feedback. Thanks for clarifying; I understand now. I did open an Atlassian ticket, thank you for the clarity and feedback.

[John Funk]

You are very welcome. And Good Luck with the ticket. Let us know how it goes. 

[helpdesk]

FYI: I have reached out to the Atlassian support, and they said no data will be lost. And, if there was a future upgrade back to Premium, the features would return to the prior state.

[Christopher Maxwell]

Hi @helpdesk

The main question here has to do with Atlassian's data retention policies - and I agree with John, I expect the data will still be there and available when you upgrade again.

My recommendation to you would be to open a support ticket with Atlassian and ask them about your scenario, and in particular the data retention. Atlassian support is phenomenal (I do suggest classifying the ticket as a low priority since it isn't critical question).

[helpdesk]

Expecting is still sketchy, what if our expectation is wrong? Could you please link the data retention policy? 

Thank you for the suggestion for Atlassian support. 

[Christopher Maxwell]

Hi @helpdesk ,

The Atlassian Data Retention policy is here: https://support.atlassian.com/security-and-access-policies/docs/track-storage-and-move-data-across-products/

The Free, Standard, Premium, and Enterprise plans all have the same data retention period of 60 days (unless using the original/old billing system). The question here is what the data that is associated with the premium subscription would be classified as. Data that is active is retained indefinitely as long as the instance is being used (i.e. issue titles and descriptions), but my understanding is that backups and such would only be retained 60 days.

[helpdesk]

Hey Christopher, that is very helpful. Thanks. I also did make a ticket to Jira Support. Much thanks.

[helpdesk]

I have reached out to the Atlassian support, who have told me the following:

"I confirm no data will be lost when downgrading to free.

If later you decide to upgrade back to Premium every data and features will be reflected back, same as before."

[John Funk]

Awesome - thanks for the verification!

[Christopher Maxwell]

@helpdesk Great confirmation, thank you for sharing.

To help keep the forums accurate and updated, please "accept answer" on this particular reply thread, or even both this thread and John's (more than one can be accepted as an answer), as John had good info, too. Another option would be to create a new answer/reply and simply mark that as answer. Goal here is simply to demarcate this issue as being answered.

And again, big thanks for the update here.