UK

United Kingdom · Business Transformation Change · Senior (5-8 years)

Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist

Here is the whole job, in plain words. What it is, a real day, what you decide, how you're judged, how people get here and where they go next. Then the part no course gives you: twelve AI tutors who learn your work.

  • Experience bandSenior (5-8 years)
  • Direct reportsNo direct reports
  • Reports toCI Manager, Process Excellence
  • UK framework levelUsually a manager, or the deepest specialist in a team

Also advertised as CI Lead · Process Excellence Consultant · Business Improvement Manager (Project-focused) · Lean Six Sigma Black Belt

Built on an analysis of 43,079 real UK job descriptions · grounded in qualifications employers recognise

Start with a free Future Fluency check, tuned to Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist

Ten quick questions, one per Future Fluency, asked against this role rather than a generic one. About five minutes, and no card.

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1What this role really is

This isn't just about drawing pretty process maps; it's about getting your hands dirty, digging into how things actually work (or don't), and then convincing people to change. You'll be the go-to expert for specific improvement projects, leading them from start to finish and helping junior colleagues learn the ropes. It's a proper blend of analytical grunt work, people skills, and a bit of detective work.

2What you'd actually use

The tools this job runs on, and how well you'd need to know each one.

Signavio / Celonis (Process Mining & Modelling)Advanced

Designing complex 'to-be' models, running simulations to predict impact, and extracting insights from process mining data to pinpoint exact bottlenecks and deviations. You'll also be training junior team members on this.

Power BI / Tableau (Data Visualization & BI)Advanced

Connecting to multiple, often messy, data sources. Using DAX/LOD expressions to create insightful, interactive dashboards that tell a compelling story about process performance and project benefits to senior leaders.

Microsoft Excel (Advanced Spreadsheets)Expert

Using Power Query for complex data transformation, building robust financial and operational models, and potentially writing VBA macros to automate repetitive data analysis tasks for your projects.

Jira / Smartsheet (Project & Portfolio Management)Advanced

Configuring project workflows, building automated reports on project progress, managing resource allocation for your projects, and overseeing a portfolio of interdependent improvement initiatives.

Confluence / Notion (Collaboration & Knowledge Management)Advanced

Designing and managing the team's knowledge base, creating standardised templates for A3s, project charters, and playbooks, ensuring all project documentation is clear and accessible.

SAP S/4HANA / Oracle NetSuite (ERP)Intermediate

Working with IT and business analysts to define functional requirements for process improvements within the ERP. You'll need to understand how configuration changes in the ERP will impact end-to-end processes.

3What you get to decide, and how that grows

Power in a job isn't your title. It's what you're allowed to decide. Here's how it grows as you move up.

The choiceComing inWhere you are nowThe step above
Project Scope ChangesEscalate to supervisor for review and approval.Propose changes to manager with justification; require manager approval.Make recommendations to project sponsor and manager; can implement minor scope adjustments with manager's awareness.
Methodology SelectionFollow established methodology as directed by supervisor.Choose appropriate methodology for routine problems within guidelines; escalate novel situations.Select and adapt methodologies (e.g., Lean Six Sigma, Kaizen) for complex projects; consult manager on significant deviations from standard practice.
Budget for Project Tools/TrainingNo authority; request all spend through supervisor.Can approve minor expenses up to £1K for project materials; escalate anything larger.Recommend and justify spend up to £10K for project-specific software, training, or external resources; requires manager's approval for commitment.
Stakeholder Communication StrategyDraft communications for supervisor review; supervisor approves and sends.Draft and send routine project updates to defined stakeholder groups; manager reviews key messages.Design and execute comprehensive communication plans for complex projects; consult manager on messaging for executive or sensitive audiences.

4How you'll be judged

The scoreboard, honestly: the hard targets, how often each one is actually looked at, and the quiet human signals that never make it onto a dashboard.

Process Cycle Time Reduction
The average time it takes to complete a specific end-to-end process that you've worked on.
Target · Reduce by 20-30% on average per project

If a customer onboarding process took 10 days, your project should bring it down to 7-8 days, saving us time and making customers happier.

Cost Savings/Avoidance
The actual money saved or prevented from being spent due to your process improvements.
Target · Deliver £250K - £750K in documented annualised savings per major project

Streamlining a procure-to-pay process that cuts manual invoice processing time, saving £300K in FTE costs annually.

Error Rate Reduction
The frequency of mistakes or defects within a process you've improved.
Target · Decrease error rates by 25-50% on key process steps

Reducing data entry errors in our CRM from 5% to 2.5%, meaning fewer customer complaints and less rework for the sales team.

Stakeholder Buy-in & Adoption
How well your proposed changes are accepted and actually used by the teams involved.
  • Project sponsors actively champion your changes
  • teams voluntarily use new processes without constant reminders
  • positive feedback in post-project surveys
  • you're often asked to present your work to other teams.
Mentorship & Capability Building
Your ability to guide and develop junior CI specialists, helping them grow their skills.
  • Junior team members successfully lead smaller workstreams under your guidance
  • they come to you for advice before escalating
  • positive feedback from your mentees and your manager during performance reviews
  • you've delivered internal training sessions.
Problem Definition & Root Cause Analysis
Your skill in getting to the heart of a problem, not just patching over symptoms.
  • Your A3 reports clearly articulate the true root cause, not just surface-level issues
  • proposed solutions address the core problem and don't create new ones
  • you challenge assumptions effectively
  • your initial problem statement often evolves significantly as you dig deeper.

5Would you like it

The honest version. What people enjoy, and what grinds them down.

What people enjoy
Solving Complex Puzzles

You get a real kick out of unpicking a tangled, inefficient process, finding the root cause of the mess, and then designing a clean, elegant solution. It's like being a detective for business operations.

Spending hours mapping out a 'current state' process, only to find the single point of failure that no one else had spotted, and then feeling that 'aha!' moment.

Making a Tangible Impact

You're not content with just writing reports; you want to see your work actually change things for the better. You want to know that because of your efforts, a team is less stressed, or a customer is happier.

Seeing the numbers on a dashboard drop (e.g., error rates, cycle time) directly because of a process you've helped implement, and getting positive feedback from the operational team.

Developing Others

You enjoy sharing your knowledge and experience, helping junior colleagues understand the methodologies, navigate tricky stakeholders, or just get unstuck on a tough problem. You like seeing others grow.

Guiding a junior analyst through their first A3 report, giving them constructive feedback, and then seeing them confidently present it to a project team.

What frustrates people
  • The 'flavour of the month' syndrome: a new initiative comes along and derails your carefully planned project.
  • Passive resistance: people agreeing in a meeting but doing nothing afterwards, or quietly sabotaging new processes.
  • The data nightmare: trying to get clean, reliable baseline data from ancient systems feels like pulling teeth.
  • Being seen as the 'process police' rather than a helpful partner.
  • Projects getting stuck in political quicksand, where logic takes a backseat to ego.
What this role does not give you
  • A quiet, predictable routine with minimal human interaction.
  • Direct authority over large teams or budgets (that comes later, if you want it).
  • The ability to make unilateral decisions about how other departments operate.
  • Guaranteed, immediate implementation of every single one of your recommendations.
  • A role where you can just focus on the technical analysis without getting involved in the 'people' side.

6Who you work with

You'll directly improve how our core business processes run, which means better customer experiences, lower operational costs, and happier employees. Your projects will often touch multiple departments, so your influence is pretty broad, even if you don't have direct reports. Get it right, and you're saving us serious money or making us more competitive.

Inside the business
  • Operations Directors and Managers (your main 'clients')
  • Product Owners and Development Leads
  • Finance Business Partners
  • IT Systems Owners
  • Marketing and Sales leadership (for customer-facing processes)
Outside the business
  • Key Vendors (where their processes impact ours)
  • Customers (through feedback loops and journey mapping)

7What you need before you start

Not a wish list. The things you would be expected to already have.

  • A proven track record of successfully leading 3-5 complex, cross-functional process improvement projects from start to finish.
  • Demonstrable experience in applying Lean Six Sigma methodologies (ideally a Green Belt certification, or equivalent practical experience).
  • Strong analytical skills, including experience with statistical analysis and data interpretation.
  • Excellent communication and interpersonal skills, with a clear ability to influence stakeholders at all levels without direct authority.
  • Experience mentoring or guiding junior team members on improvement projects.
  • A solid understanding of change management principles and practical experience in managing the 'people side' of change.

8What to practise next

Where the job is going, and what to do about it starting this week.

Prompt Engineering & LLM Integration for Analysis

Competitors are already using Large Language Models (LLMs) to draft reports, summarise research, and even assist with data analysis in minutes, tasks that used to take hours. Analysts who master this will outproduce their peers significantly.

Context windows and token limits (understanding wh · Temperature settings for different tasks (creativi · Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) for using pro · Output validation and hallucination detection (kno · Prompt chaining for complex, multi-step analysis

  • This week: Set up GitHub Copilot or equivalent and use it for every piece of code or data manipulation you do.
  • This month: Experiment with Claude or ChatGPT to summarise a complex report or draft an initial process document.
  • Month 2: Try to build one automated report or analysis summary using an LLM API (even a simple one).
  • Month 3: Document your productivity gains and share your best prompts with the team.

Quick win: Start using AI tools to draft email summaries, meeting notes, or code comments today. It's low-risk and immediately helpful.

Advanced Data Storytelling with Interactive Visualisations

It's not enough to just create dashboards anymore. Senior leaders are drowning in data. The ability to craft a truly compelling narrative with interactive visualisations that guide the user to key insights is becoming paramount for influencing decisions.

Principles of visual perception for data display · Narrative structures for data presentations · Interactive dashboard design (drill-downs, filters · Using animation and transitions effectively · Tailoring visualisations for different audiences (

  • This month: Watch a few talks by data visualisation experts (e.g., Cole Nussbaumer Knaflic, Edward Tufte).
  • Month 2: Pick one of your existing dashboards and redesign it with a clear narrative flow and interactive elements.
  • Month 3: Get feedback from a non-technical colleague on whether your new dashboard tells a clear story.
  • Month 4: Take an advanced course on Power BI or Tableau storytelling features.

Quick win: Before your next presentation, think about the single most important message. Design one chart that screams that message, and build your story around it.

9Staying current once you are in

What people here do to keep up
  • Attend industry conferences or webinars focused on process mining, intelligent automation, or advanced CI techniques.
  • Join professional networks like the Lean Enterprise Institute or the Association of Business Process Management Professionals.
  • Regularly read books, articles, and research papers on emerging trends in business transformation and operational excellence.
  • Seek out opportunities to mentor junior colleagues, even informally, to hone your leadership and coaching skills.

10How the AI economy is changing work like this

Before we ask anything of you, here's what we can already say about AI and work of this kind:

The new skill this role is being asked for: AI-Driven Process Orchestration

AI isn't just for analysis anymore; it's starting to automate decision-making and orchestrate complex workflows in real-time. Understanding how to design processes that can be partially or fully automated by AI will be a game-changer for efficiency.

We'll only ever tell you what we can actually back up. No hype, no scare tactics.

The rising capability

Zavmo analysis

What's rising in its place

This is where the work is heading, and the higher pay with it. Get fluent here and the shift stops being a threat and starts being your edge.

AI-Driven Process Orchestration

AI isn't just for analysis anymore; it's starting to automate decision-making and orchestrate complex workflows in real-time. Understanding how to design processes that can be partially or fully automated by AI will be a game-changer for efficiency.

  • Intelligent Automation (RPA + AI)
  • Decision Management Systems
  • Event-Driven Architectures
  • AI-powered workflow engines
  • Human-in-the-loop design for AI processes

What you’ll use

Skills this role draws on

Technical

  • Lean Six Sigma (DMAIC/DMADV)
  • Value Stream Mapping (VSM)
  • Change Management (Prosci ADKAR / Kotter's 8-Step)
  • Business Process Management (BPM) & Modelling
  • Theory of Constraints (TOC)

The pathway

How you actually get there, here

How you become one varies far more by country than what one does. This is the UK route. Most people take one of these ways in; the right one depends on where you're starting from.

  1. 1

    Continuous Improvement Specialist (L2)

    2-3 years

    Skills to master

    • Independently leading smaller projects, mastering core Lean Six Sigma tools, effective stakeholder engagement for single-department changes.

    You're ready to move on when

    • Successfully delivered 3+ projects with measurable impact.
    • Consistently receives positive feedback from project sponsors.
    • Can confidently facilitate small workshops and present findings.
    • Has started informally mentoring new team members.
  2. 2

    Process Analyst / Business Analyst (from another company)

    3-5 years

    Skills to master

    • Translating business requirements into process designs, data analysis, understanding end-to-end business flows, and developing strong influencing skills.

    You're ready to move on when

    • Experience mapping complex processes and identifying inefficiencies.
    • Strong analytical and data interpretation skills.
    • Demonstrated ability to work with diverse stakeholder groups.
    • A clear passion for continuous improvement, even if not in a dedicated CI role.
  3. 3

    Operations Manager / Team Lead (internal move)

    4-6 years

    Skills to master

    • Deep operational knowledge, understanding frontline challenges, managing teams, and identifying opportunities for efficiency gains from within a business unit.

    You're ready to move on when

    • Successfully managed an operational team and improved its performance.
    • Identified and implemented process improvements within their own department.
    • Strong understanding of the day-to-day realities and pain points of the business.
    • A desire to move from managing people to managing processes and change.

11Where this role leads

The long view:Your journey here isn't just a job; it's a chance to build a truly impactful career. We're looking for someone who wants to grow, learn, and genuinely make a difference to how our business operates. If you're up for the challenge, the opportunities are pretty vast.

Pay & demand

Pay and demand for this role will appear here, each figure traced to a named authoritative source (e.g. the ONS Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings, under the Open Government Licence). We don’t show numbers we can’t attribute.

The ten Future Fluencies

Zavmo analysis

The credential is what you can do today. These are what keep you valuable.

A qualification proves you can do the job as it's defined today. These ten are what decide whether you're still the obvious person for it in five years. They're the capabilities employers are now writing into senior roles faster than people are learning them. Zavmo weaves them through whatever you study, so you come out with both: the credential and the fluency.

The highlighted ones are the Fluencies your role leans on hardest, from how Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist is actually changing. In about two minutes, the free confidence check asks where you stand on each of the ten. That's the whole check, and it's what makes the plan yours rather than generic.

Where it leads

Roles this leads to

The record names a next step, but the catalogue has no page for it yet:

  • CI Manager / Principal Process Architect (L4)

12The team that's yours

No two people are taught the same way. This is one-to-one, not one-to-many.

Zavmo is a hyper-personalised AI learning platform. Twelve virtual tutors, each with a different way of teaching, and one orchestration agent that picks the right one for the moment. So every single lesson is shaped around you, your role, and the way you learn. Not a course everyone sits through. A conversation built for you, and no one else.

…and nine more, matched to you after your first chat. Meet all twelve

Start free and meet yours

13What it feels like

A conversation, not a course

Because your tutor knows your role, your projects and your last session, learning sounds like this. And it's different for every single person:

Leading the carrying out of Six Sigma process mappingLevel 4

Applied to your work in Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist

By completing this unit, learners will be able to lead the carrying out of Six Sigma process mapping, demonstrating both practical application and a comprehensive understanding of the methodologies involved.

How the thinking builds
  1. Remember
  2. Understand
  3. Apply
  4. Analyse
  5. Evaluate
  6. Create
An illustration of a Zavmo lesson, built from this role’s own route. The unit, its objective and every criterion above are the awarding body’s own words, not an example.

One to one, not one to many

No two people run this the same way

A course is written once and handed to everyone. This is assembled around you, and keeps changing as it learns you. Five things it reads, and what each one changes.

  1. Your actual work Every lesson is taught against a live piece of your own work, not a worked example from a textbook.
  2. What you already know The first conversation finds your starting point, so you skip what you can already do and spend the time on what you cannot.
  3. The conditions you learn under Not a learning-styles quiz. The evidence does not support those. The dimensions the research does back, read once and used to shape the plan.
  4. How far you got last time It picks up mid-thought. The tutor knows what you said, what you struggled with, and what it asked you to try.
  5. Which tutor suits the moment Twelve of them, each for a different kind of thinking. The one who walks you through a first idea is not the one who stress-tests it.

See how you learn, free. Eight questions, no sign-up. A directional taster; the diagnostic inside Zavmo goes deeper and keeps adapting.

DemonstrateIllustration

Evidenced on your work in Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist

You do not finish by watching something. You finish by showing it on the work you already do, against the measures this job is judged on.

  • Process Cycle Time ReductionThe average time it takes to complete a specific end-to-end process that you've worked on.If a customer onboarding process took 10 days, your project should bring it down to 7-8 days, saving us time and making customers happier.Reduce by 20-30% on average per project
  • Cost Savings/AvoidanceThe actual money saved or prevented from being spent due to your process improvements.Streamlining a procure-to-pay process that cuts manual invoice processing time, saving £300K in FTE costs annually.Deliver £250K - £750K in documented annualised savings per major project
  • Error Rate ReductionThe frequency of mistakes or defects within a process you've improved.Reducing data entry errors in our CRM from 5% to 2.5%, meaning fewer customer complaints and less rework for the sales team.Decrease error rates by 25-50% on key process steps
These are this job's own measures, with its own targets. Nothing is marked evidenced, because nobody has started this yet. Yours would fill in from the work you bring.

Your passport

This isn't a certificate you file away. It's a passport to the life you're designing.

Every credit you earn and every fluency you build adds up: evidence where it counts, carried with you. Zavmo keeps the map: where you are, where you're heading, and the next step, at your pace, around your life. From Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist to CI Manager / Principal Process Architect (L4), and whatever you decide comes after.

Level 5 · in progressAI Fluency→ CI Manager / Principal Process Architect (L4)→ your design
Where this takes you

Your journey here isn't just a job; it's a chance to build a truly impactful career. We're looking for someone who wants to grow, learn, and genuinely make a difference to how our business operates. If you're up for the challenge, the opportunities are pretty vast.

See Your Progress GrowIllustration
Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist
  • Lean Six Sigma (DMAIC/DMADV)
  • Value Stream Mapping (VSM)
  • Change Management (Prosci ADKAR / Kotter's 8-Step)
  • Business Process Management (BPM) & Modelling
  • Theory of Constraints (TOC)
This is your Mind Palace on learn.zavmo.ai. Every skill above comes from this role's own record, not an example borrowed from another job. A node lights up when you evidence it, and what you build stays yours between jobs. That is the part a course cannot do.

14The detail, folded away

Everything else the record holds

The career branches in full, how AI is already showing up in the day-to-day, and the questions people ask about this job. Here when you want them, out of the way while you decide.

Where it leads next, rung by rung

Where it leads

The career path, and where it branches

Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist is a start, not a ceiling. Each step below asks for new skills and hands back more autonomy.

  1. CI Manager / Principal Process Architect (L4)

    3-5 years

    Lead/Staff

    • Portfolio Management: Overseeing multiple interdependent CI projects, managing dependencies and risks.
    • Enterprise Process Architecture: Designing complex, end-to-end process solutions that span the entire organisation.
    • Vendor Management: Evaluating and managing relationships with external CI consultants or technology providers.
    • Advanced Analytics: Using more sophisticated statistical modelling and predictive analytics to identify improvement opportunities.
Working with AI on the job

Working with AI

Where AI is starting to help

Let's be honest, continuous improvement is often about sifting through mountains of data, trying to make sense of messy processes, and then painstakingly crafting communications to get people on board. What if you could cut out a huge chunk of that grunt work? We're talking about using AI not to replace you, but to make you ridiculously more productive.

At Zavmo, we're building an AI Productivity Hub specifically for roles like yours. It's not just a bunch of buzzwords; it's practical tools and techniques that will free you up to focus on the truly strategic, human-centric parts of your job—the stuff only you can do. Imagine spending less time on tedious tasks and more time actually driving change.

Automated Process Discovery

Use AI-powered process mining tools (like Celonis) to automatically analyse system event logs from our ERP (SAP) or CRM (Salesforce). This instantly generates a detailed, objective map of the 'as-is' process, highlighting bottlenecks and deviations without weeks of manual interviews. You'll get to the root cause much faster.

Insight Acceleration from Unstructured Data

Apply Natural Language Processing (NLP) models to quickly analyse thousands of free-text entries from customer support tickets, employee surveys, or call centre transcripts. This helps you instantly identify and categorise recurring process friction points and pain areas that would take weeks to read manually.

Benchmarking & Best Practice Research

Use an AI assistant (like ChatGPT or Perplexity) to rapidly research and synthesise industry benchmarks, academic frameworks, and case studies for a specific process. Need to know 'best practices for a procure-to-pay process in the manufacturing sector'? Get a concise summary in minutes, not hours.

Change Management Content Generation

Use generative AI to create first drafts of change management communications, FAQs, training video scripts, and process documentation. Just give it your project charter and key talking points, and it'll give you a solid starting point, letting you focus on refining the message and engaging stakeholders.

Common questions

Common questions

How do you become a Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist?

Common routes in include Continuous Improvement Specialist (L2) (2-3 years), Process Analyst / Business Analyst (from another company) (3-5 years) and Operations Manager / Team Lead (internal move) (4-6 years). Times vary with prior experience.

Where can a Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist progress to?

This role can lead on to CI Manager / Principal Process Architect (L4) (3-5 years), depending on the skills you build.

What level is a Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist in the UK?

This role aligns to RQF Level 5 on the UK framework, a guide to the depth of qualification it maps to, not a hard entry bar.

What new skills matter most for a Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist?

Increasingly, AI-Driven Process Orchestration. These are the areas where the higher-paid, future-proof work is heading.

The honest bit

You’ve started things before

Most of them were built for a room full of people who aren’t you. A cohort moves on whether or not your week allowed it, and by the third week the thing you’re behind on becomes the reason you stop opening it.

There’s no cohort here, and no timetable to fall behind. Before anything starts, Zavmo asks when you’re sharpest and how long you can realistically sit down for, then builds the sessions around those answers. A bad fortnight changes your pace. It doesn’t put you behind.

And you only pay once you start learning. Searching and planning are free, and you can cancel any time — so the cost of finding out is an afternoon, not a year.

What it costs

Less than one coaching session. Every month.

A single career-coaching hour costs more than a month of this, and it ends when the hour does. Zavmo doesn't. It's £70 a month, about £2.30 a day, for a companion that knows a Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist, works on the job you actually do, and keeps going at your pace rather than a timetable's.

  • Searching and planning stay free. You only pay when you start learning.
  • Your credits are yours. Regulated, and they don't vanish when a subscription ends.
  • Cancel any time and billing stops. No notice period, no minimum term.

Your path, personalised

You have the map. Walking it is the part we do together.

This route runs to 7 national skill standards. That is a real journey.

Zavmo shapes a learning experience as unique as you are. It fits how you learn, your pace and the work you already do. Every step stays benchmarked to recognised national standards. That’s the plan for becoming a Senior Continuous Improvement Specialist: personal to you, and it still counts. The first steps are free.

Independent research finds well-designed intelligent tutoring performs nearly as well as one-to-one human tutoring: VanLehn (2011), Educational Psychologist.

A private tutor in the UK averages £35–40 an hour . Zavmo is £70/month.

A real plan on learn.zavmo.ai: Ofqual-regulated units, credits, and a three-month run at your own pace.
Start free No commitment. See your first steps free.

15Where to go from here

Other roles at Level 5

Same depth of qualification, different job. Useful if the work appeals but this particular role does not.

Other roles in Business Transformation Change

Stay in the field you know and move sideways rather than up.

If you leave this industry

The skills you'll gain here are highly transferable. Continuous Improvement principles are universal, so you could easily move into similar roles in almost any industry – from technology and healthcare to retail and public services. Your ability to drive efficiency and manage change is always in demand.

Not sure this is the right direction?

Work out what you actually want from work first, then come back and see which roles fit it. Takes about ten minutes.

This role profile is © 2026Growth Engineering Technologies Ltd. Built from UK occupational standards and regulated qualification data, and written for Zavmo.

You're not behind. You're right on time. The shift is only just beginning. Your role won't look the same in two years. Be the one who leads the change, not the one it happens to. Build my plan, free Here's the first ten minutes: a 2-minute confidence check → your personalised roadmap → meet the tutors matched to you. No card, cancel any time. No card. Build your plan, see your roadmap and meet the twelve tutors matched to you. All free. When you're ready to start learning, it's £70 a month, billed monthly. Cancel any time and billing stops.