When will my PAYG account be charged and how much will I be charged?

- If you are on a Pay-as-you-go (PAYG) package, we will calculate your usage on the last day of the month.

If you upgrade from free to PAYG after the month has started, then you will be charged for your usage from the time of the upgrade until and including the last day of the month. The invoice will be created on the 1st of the following month, covering the previous month's usage.

For example, if you upgrade on the 5th of June your invoice will be created on the 1st of July covering the usage from June 5 to June 30, both included.

Similarly, if you downgrade from PAYG to free at any time after the month has started, you will be charged for the usage incurred up to the 1st of the following month, when your account will revert to the free package.

For example, if you downgrade on the 14th of June your last invoice will be created on the 1st of July covering the usage from June 14 to June 30 and your account will go back to the free plan on July 1st.

Note: Once you have upgraded to a PAYG plan, your usage is counted in full from the first message, channel, connection, etc.

This means that the PAYG quota does not start on top of the free package quota, but it starts from any usage.

You can use the below formula to estimate your monthly bill, as this will be:

$2.50 per million messages
$15 per thousand peak connections
$15 per thousand peak channels

*Figures are rounded up to the next tier, so the first million messages will be $2.50, and once you reach 1,000,001 you go into the next pricing tier so it's another $2.50, etc.

*The same logic applies to channels and connections: $15 for the first 1000 peak connections, but once you make from 1001-2000 you will pay $30 ($15 +$15), and so on.

For example, if you send 4.5M messages in the month and had 1,400 channels active with a total of 2,900 connections at your busiest point in the month, you would have a bill for $87.50

5m messages at $2.50/million = $12.50
2k channels at $15/k = $30
3k connections at $15/k = $45

If you stay within the first tier (from 1 message, 1 peak channel and 1 peak connection) you will be billed a total of $32.50 as shown below:

Up to 1m messages at $2.50/million = $2.50
Up to 1K channels at $15/k = $15
Up to 1K connections at $15/k = $15

- If you are on a Committed used package, you will be charged as specified in your contract (usually at the start of the month).

Should you experience any issues with payment then please get in touch and we'll be happy to help. You can do this by contacting us, starting a chat or emailing support@ably.com.

Note: If you are on a Self Service package still, we will continue to charge your account on the first day of the month.