Cancelling FreeAgent: no notice period, access that ends the moment you cancel, no refunds, the free bank offer and your data

FreeAgent has no notice period and no minimum term. A direct subscription renews automatically, monthly or annually, until someone with full access cancels it, and FreeAgent's terms say you can close the account at any time. The catch is timing. FreeAgent's help centre says a cancellation takes immediate effect, so you lose access to your books the moment you confirm it, and there is no pro-rata refund for the rest of the period you have paid for. Many FreeAgent users pay nothing at all, because the software is free with a NatWest, Royal Bank of Scotland, Ulster Bank or Mettle business account, and that changes what leaving looks like.

This guide covers how FreeAgent bills, when and how to cancel, refunds, price changes, the free bank offer and what happens to your data. It is based on FreeAgent's Terms of Service (version 4.10, last updated 2 June 2026), its General Privacy Notice (version 6.11, last updated February 2026), its free accounting software and Mettle pages, and ten FreeAgent help-centre articles on cancelling on the web and on mobile, reactivating, deleting an account, exporting data, editing a subscription, subscription invoices, switching to a bank-funded account, moving off an Apple subscription and closing a client's account, all checked on 2 November 2026. Under the terms you contract with FreeAgent Central Limited, a company registered in Scotland. Prices are not quoted here because they change and depend on your business type; check FreeAgent's pricing page.

How a FreeAgent subscription bills

• Monthly or annual: the terms say that once a free trial ends, FreeAgent renews the subscription automatically and bills the card you gave at setup, monthly or annually as you chose, until the account is closed. The prices you see depend on whether your business is set up as a sole trader, partnership, LLP or limited company.
• Changing the schedule: under Billing, then Edit Subscription, you can switch the payment schedule. The edit subscription article says a change from monthly to annual takes the next payment immediately, while a change from annual to monthly is applied on your renewal date. The terms add that if you change your subscription package, the new amount takes effect at the next billing cycle.
• Who can manage it: editing the subscription, viewing subscription invoices and cancelling all need full (level 8) access. A PDF of each subscription invoice is emailed to the billing email address on the payment date, and the invoice history sits under Billing.
• When FreeAgent does not bill you: the invoices article says you will see no subscription invoices if your account is provided free by your bank, by your accountant (who handles the billing), or as part of MyBusinessWorks. If you signed up through the Apple App Store, Apple emails you the invoice.

No notice period, but access ends the moment you cancel

Nothing in FreeAgent's terms or help centre asks for notice. The terms say you can close the account at any time using the cancel option on the Billing page of the website or the app, and that no further subscription fees will be billed for the following month. That makes FreeAgent simpler to leave than Xero, where leaving costs a further month, or Sage, which asks for five working days before the billing date. There is no notice period to miss.

What FreeAgent does instead is end your access straight away. Its cancellation article says that if you cancel you immediately lose access to your account, and the warning on the cancellation screen says the cancellation takes immediate effect and you will no longer be able to log in. That is the opposite of QuickBooks Online, where access runs to the end of the period you have paid for. The terms say no refund is made for subscription fees already billed and paid, and the help centre says FreeAgent cannot offer a pro-rata refund for any remaining unused period. So there is nothing to gain by cancelling well before your next payment date, and something to lose: days you have already paid for, at the point you are most likely to want your records.

How to cancel FreeAgent

On the web

You need full (level 8) access. FreeAgent's cancellation article gives these steps:

1. 1Open the drop-down menu at the top right of the screen and select Billing.
2. 2Scroll down and select Cancel My Subscription at the bottom of the screen. A warning says the cancellation takes immediate effect, and a notice says your data will be deleted automatically after one year.
3. 3Choose a reason from the Reason drop-down menu, adding anything you want in the Details box.
4. 4Select Cancel My Subscription to finish, or I've changed my mind to back out.

The same article says any GoCardless mandates you have set up with contacts are cancelled automatically, and any bank feeds are disabled, so arrange another way to collect from those customers first. Cancelling does not opt you out of FreeAgent's marketing emails; use the Unsubscribe link at the bottom of one of them.

On the mobile app

FreeAgent's mobile article says cancelling from the app is available on iOS only, and it hands you over to the desktop site: tap the menu button, select your business name, then My details, then Additional settings & password reset, log in, and select Billing from the drop-down menu at the top right. From there the steps are the same as on the web.

If Apple, your accountant or your bank pays

• Apple App Store: FreeAgent's article on moving off an Apple subscription says the auto-renewal is cancelled from the FreeAgent mobile app, under Settings, then Subscription, then Manage Subscriptions, following Apple's steps from there.
• Your accountant: if your accountant provides FreeAgent, the invoices article says they handle the billing, and the reactivation article tells you to talk to them rather than FreeAgent. Ask them how to end it and what their own terms say. FreeAgent's practice article on closing a client's account says the accountant keeps read-only access while the client loses access completely, and that a closed account cannot be reopened, so export your data before your accountant closes it.
• Your bank: a bank-funded account has no fee to stop. The reactivation article says that if you cancel a NatWest, Royal Bank of Scotland, Ulster Bank or Mettle-funded account, you cannot reactivate it yourself and have to contact FreeAgent support before the data is deleted.

Refunds: none when you cancel

The terms say no refund will be made for subscription fees already billed and paid, and that no refund is payable if FreeAgent withdraws access for the reasons the terms list, which include late payment. The cancellation and delete account articles both say FreeAgent cannot offer a pro-rata refund for any remaining unused period. On an annual plan that can be most of a year. If you think you might leave part way through the next year, switch the payment schedule from annual to monthly before the renewal date; the edit subscription article says that change applies on your renewal date.

The one refund FreeAgent describes is for moving to a bank-funded account. Its switching article says an annual subscriber who switches receives a refund for the unused portion, calculated and shown before you confirm, and normally processed within 5 to 10 days, to the original card where possible, with a VAT credit note in the Billing area.

Price changes and introductory discounts

The terms say subscription rates are posted on FreeAgent's website and may vary from time to time, and that FreeAgent will always let you know in advance of changes in the fees for its core accounting package and give you the chance to decide whether to carry on before any increase. The section on changes to the contract is more specific: FreeAgent emails you about changes to its terms, and where a change relates to price or payment terms it gives not less than 60 days' advance notice. If you do not agree to a change, you can end the contract by closing the account. Treat a pricing email from FreeAgent as a decision with a date on it, and keep the billing email address under Edit Subscription pointed at an inbox someone reads.

Introductory discounts run out. The terms say a discount for customers paying annually applies to the first year, with later years payable at the price applicable at the time, and a monthly discount applies for a period of time, after which you pay the monthly price then applying. The discount you receive is confirmed on screen when you first pay and in a pricing confirmation email, so keep that email: it is your record of when the price goes up. See how to cap a renewal uplift for the wider pattern.

Free with NatWest, Royal Bank of Scotland, Ulster Bank or Mettle

FreeAgent is part of NatWest Group, and its terms define a third kind of customer, the Free User. You qualify if you hold a live and eligible business current account or foundation account with NatWest, Royal Bank of Scotland or Ulster Bank (Northern Ireland only), or a live Mettle business account on which you make at least one transaction each month. The terms say you pay no subscription fee unless your eligibility changes, although optional add-ons may be chargeable. FreeAgent's free accounting software page says it is free for as long as you retain your bank account, with one free FreeAgent account for each NatWest Group business bank account you hold. The switching article says personal bank accounts do not qualify.

There is a trade-off for some businesses. The terms say that on a free account a limited company or incorporated partnership is automatically shown Commercial Insights, which the switching article describes as tailored insights including links to products from partners, and cannot turn them off unless it becomes a paying customer or moves to an account provided by an accountant or reseller. Sole traders and unincorporated partnerships see them only with consent.

Switching an existing paid account

The switching article says you add your bank's business current account in the Banking area on the desktop site and enable an Open Banking bank feed for it, after which FreeAgent prompts you to switch. When you confirm, future monthly payments are cancelled, or an annual subscriber is refunded the unused portion as above. An account bought through the Apple App Store has to move to a direct subscription first, and an account provided by your accountant can only be switched through your accountant. If you change your mind later, FreeAgent's support team can switch you back.

When you leave the bank

This is where a free account turns into a bill. The terms say that if the arrangement comes to an end, or you are no longer entitled to benefit from it, you may carry on using FreeAgent by becoming a directly charged, paying customer within 30 days of the arrangement ending. FreeAgent's Mettle page is blunter: if you do not make one transaction a month, or you close your Mettle account, a FreeAgent subscription will be charged while you continue to use the software.

Neither the terms nor the help articles say how FreeAgent learns that a NatWest, Royal Bank of Scotland or Ulster Bank account has closed, or how much warning you get before charging starts. If you are moving your business banking, ask FreeAgent support before you close the account, and decide then whether to pay for FreeAgent directly, or export your data and leave.

Your data: one year after cancelling, seven days after deleting

Cancelling is not deleting. The cancellation article says FreeAgent stores your account data securely for one year after you cancel and then deletes it automatically, and a direct subscriber can reactivate at any point in that year by logging in and selecting Reactivate my account. The reactivation article adds that any days left over from your original subscription are added to the new one. FreeAgent's General Privacy Notice gives the same one-year period for cancelled accounts, and says archived database backups are kept for two years before being permanently deleted. Once your data has been deleted, FreeAgent says it cannot recover it; to come back you sign up for a new account.

Deleting the account, under Settings then Delete Account, is the faster route: the delete account article says your data is scheduled for permanent deletion seven days later and cannot be recovered after that. Separately, the terms let FreeAgent close an account with no activity for two years, on one month's notice, with the data then kept in line with its privacy notice.

Because cancelling locks you out at once, export before you cancel. The terms say FreeAgent is not responsible for backing up customer data, so your own export is the copy that counts. Under Settings, then Export All Data, someone with full access can download the account data as an Excel spreadsheet, covering bank accounts and transactions, payslips, contacts, projects, invoices, estimates, bills, expenses, timeslips, VAT returns and more, or every uploaded file and receipt image as a zip file. FreeAgent emails a link when the export is ready, and the download expires after 7 days. The export is for record keeping only and cannot be restored into FreeAgent.

Some records need extra steps. VAT returns, profit and loss, the balance sheet and the trial balance are exported as PDFs from each report, invoices are saved one at a time with Save as PDF, and the cancellation article suggests keeping copies of your Self Assessment tax returns and VAT returns. Download your subscription invoices from Billing too, while you can still log in.

A routine for FreeAgent

1. 1For each FreeAgent account, write down how it is paid for (direct monthly, direct annual, Apple, your accountant or a bank), the next payment date under Billing, who has full (level 8) access, and the billing email address.
2. 2If the account is bank-funded, note which business account funds it, and make FreeAgent part of any decision to close or move that bank account.
3. 3When FreeAgent emails about a price or terms change, note the date it applies and decide before then. The terms promise at least 60 days' notice of a price change.
4. 4If you might leave during the next year, switch an annual plan to monthly before the renewal date.
5. 5To leave, export your data and files, save reports and invoices, set up another way to collect any GoCardless payments, then cancel in the last few days before the next payment date.
6. 6Keep a note of the cancellation date, so you know when the one-year retention period ends.

UK consumer protections around subscriptions mostly do not reach a business customer; see the UK subscription rules for business software. FreeAgent's terms say Scots law applies and the Scottish courts have exclusive jurisdiction if your business's registered address is in Scotland, and that English law and the English courts apply otherwise.

Tracking FreeAgent in StackTrackr

Record each FreeAgent account as its own tool. On annual billing, enter the cost of the full year with an annual billing cycle; on monthly billing, enter the monthly cost with a monthly billing cycle. Tick Auto-renews and set the renewal date to the next payment date shown under Billing. Make the tool's owner someone with full (level 8) access, or the person who decides whether you stay on FreeAgent, so the reminders reach someone who can act on them.

FreeAgent sets no notice period, so the number you enter is your own lead time: enough days to export your data and save your reports before the payment date. StackTrackr counts it back from the renewal date to give you a cancellation deadline, shows it in the register's Cancel by column, and reminds you ahead of it and again on the day. A week suits a monthly plan; on an annual plan, a longer period such as 30 days leaves time to decide, export, or switch to monthly before the renewal date. Starter alerts at 30 and 7 days; Team and up use a cadence you set, 90, 60, 30 and 7 days by default. Once you have cancelled, switch auto-renew off, and put the cancellation date in Notes so you know when FreeAgent's one-year retention ends.

If FreeAgent is free through your bank, record it anyway with a cost of zero, and say in Notes which business account funds it, so whoever closes or moves that account knows FreeAgent will start charging. If FreeAgent tells you about a price change, schedule the price change with the date it applies so your forecasts include it. Keep the pricing confirmation email and your subscription invoices in the tool's document vault. Have a look at what it tracks, or start a free trial and add your FreeAgent subscription first.