We've just upgraded to trial the Power Plan. But the features don't work

Laura Martin
Laura Martin Member Posts: 15 VERIFIED MEMBER
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edited December 2023 in Sales CRM #1

Through some chats over the past 24 hours, I've been told a few things:

  1. It's an engineering problem that some members don't have access to Projects
  2. You don't get the added features in a trial that you would if it wasn't a trial; that we need to pay for the Project seats in order to get the Project seats added. (huh? What's the point of a trial upgrade if you don't get to try the features? There's not even the chance for me to buy the Power version-- by default it's a free trial)
  3. That we better NOT Pay for the additional seats to have access to Projects during the trial because PD has a no refund policy.

After being a customer for 8 years, this is very odd and confusing to me. Not my normal PD experience. HELP!!!!

Answers

  • Jared
    Jared Member Posts: 53 VERIFIED MEMBER
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    @Laura Martin I am curious about what problems you are trying to solve by adding projects. Ultimately, if you identify that the investment would help your team better track your projects and centralize your data, it seems like a good move to add the projects feature.

    A strategy I have used before when implementing a new feature with a team is to have someone who is more advanced test out the product before we buy seats for everyone. That way, we can test things out before making a more significant investment.

    Let me know if that helps out.

  • Laura Martin
    Laura Martin Member Posts: 15 VERIFIED MEMBER
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    @Jared == It is the funniest thing. Exactly like your recommendation, we'd added a few Projects seats to our original plan, then once we realized it would be great for our whole team, we decided to upgrade to the Power Plan (which is advertised to include the Project seats for the whole team). We did the upgrade, but then were unable to add the other team members' Projects seats.

    What we finally learned through a number of odd and disappointing conversations with PD Support and "Success" teams, that because we had been paying for seats in a previous plan, they were not included in the upgrade (even though the upgrade in fact includes Projects). The issue appears to be that the problem happened because Pipedrive is running a free upgrade trial to PowerPlan We didn't want an upgrade trial (we were happy to invest in it), but because it was automatically free, the Project seats are only included for clients who have never paid for Project seats before.

    The only way we could resolve the issue was to downgrade to our prior plan, then purchase seats for the other team members who didn't have Projects access prior to the upgrade.

    I've been Pipedrive client for seven years, and it's the first time they've left me shaking my head. Out of desperation, I tried to contact someone in Pipedrive management via LinkedIN, but to no avail. At least I've got you, @Jared !

  • Sophie
    Sophie Pipedrive Team Posts: 203 PIPEDRIVE TEAM
    Third Anniversary 100 Comments 5 Answers 5 Likes

    Hi @Laura Martin,

    I would be happy to elaborate on this!

    Projects is part of the Power plan but if you are already on a lower plan and have already purchased project seats it is not available during the trial period, I believe this is the situation you found yourself in. This is actually expected behavior and not an engineering problem, it’s done by design because we don’t have the option to enable “free usage” of projects and then disable it when you already have a subscription with us.

    I would like to clarify that if you do become a paying customers of the Power plan, you will have access to Projects as it is included in the plan. During the trial period of Power, if you are not already paying for projects, you will have access to the feature. In other words, if you had not already purchased the Projects seats before you started your trial, they would have been available for you through your Power trial period.

    I did also want to note that if you begin a free trial of a plan and you would like to end your trial period early, you can reach out to support and we can assist you with ending your trial, you are not required to go through the entire free trial period!

    The other solution here would have been to end your Power plan trial early and become a paying account for the Power plan and then you would have had full access to the Projects feature!

    I hope this helps to clarify!

  • Laura Martin
    Laura Martin Member Posts: 15 VERIFIED MEMBER
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    @Sophie --

    Thanks! Where were you for the week we were stuck in the Pipedrive version of an Excel Circular Reference? ha! :-) Three support chats, two Customer Success unsuccesses.

    Over the week I was told we were being sent to Engineering, then to management, that we should clear our cache and cookies and then finally the answer we got was to downgrade and pay for Projects again.

    On a totally other note, would there be a chance we could connect with someone live about our account?

  • Jared
    Jared Member Posts: 53 VERIFIED MEMBER
    5 Answers 10 Comments 5 Likes Combo Breaker

    @Laura Martin best of luck. Hopefully, you can get back on track. I am impressed with how kind and professional you are handling this frustration—best of luck.

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