# Credit and plans

> How a Company pays for up4: starting credit, topping up, Team and Agency plans, what happens when credit runs out, invoices and cancelling.

Source: https://upfour.io/docs/credit-and-plans

Afterwards you know what pays for your checks, how to add credit or choose a plan, and what happens when the credit runs out.

- **Who:** Owner or administrator
- **Time:** About three minutes
- **What you need:** A card for top-ups and plans

Other roles cannot top up or change a plan. The starting credit needs no card.

**In up4:** Company › Billing · [Open in up4](https://app.upfour.io/settings/billing)

## Three ways to pay

| Way | How it works |
| --- | --- |
| **Starting credit** | Every new Company starts with €9 and every feature, without a card. Checks, check-ins and the monthly minimum draw from it. Light use lasts at most 3 months; heavier use ends it sooner. Until the first payment a Company can have 50 monitors and 20 scheduled jobs. |
| **Pay as you go** | You top up a balance, from €10. Usage draws from it and the balance never goes below zero. Each month costs at least €3; usage counts toward that minimum, so a month above it pays usage only. After the first top-up there is no limit on the number of monitors. |
| **Team** | €19 a month or €190 a year. Includes usage worth €180 at list price, about 20 million checks, and 100 monitors. |
| **Agency** | €49 a month or €490 a year. Includes usage worth €600, about 66 million checks, and 500 monitors. |

What each plan includes, from monitors to subscribers, is listed in [Limits and allowances](https://upfour.io/docs/reference/limits#plans). What counts as usage is in [What costs money](https://upfour.io/docs/how/what-costs-money.md).

## Steps

### 1. [Look at your balance and plan](https://upfour.io/docs/credit-and-plans#look)

Open **Billing**. On the starting credit or pay as you go the page leads with your **Balance**. While the starting credit lasts, the page header shows how much of the **Starting credit** is left. **Transactions** starts with the starting credit and lists every top-up, every day of usage and the monthly minimum.

[![](https://upfour.io/docs/images/walk/en/credit-and-plans-look.webp)](https://upfour.io/docs/images/walk/en/credit-and-plans-look.webp)

### 2. [Top up the balance](https://upfour.io/docs/credit-and-plans#top-up)

Under **Top up** choose an amount or enter your own under **Other amount**. The smallest top-up is €10, plus VAT where it applies; below it the button stays disabled. You pay in a secure checkout and the balance rises.

Switch on **Auto-reload** to top up on its own when the balance falls below a threshold. Not every payment setup offers it. When yours does not, the page says so.

[![](https://upfour.io/docs/images/walk/en/credit-and-plans-top-up.webp)](https://upfour.io/docs/images/walk/en/credit-and-plans-top-up.webp)

### 3. [Or choose a plan](https://upfour.io/docs/credit-and-plans#plan)

Under **Prefer a plan?** pick **Monthly** or **Yearly**, then select Choose Team or Choose Agency. A yearly term costs ten monthly prices for twelve months. Prices are net; VAT is added at checkout where it applies. Each card shows the price, the monitors, the seats and the regions with their retention. If a checkout is not available, the button reads Temporarily unavailable instead.

[![](https://upfour.io/docs/images/walk/en/credit-and-plans-plan.webp)](https://upfour.io/docs/images/walk/en/credit-and-plans-plan.webp)

### 4. [Set a spend alert](https://upfour.io/docs/credit-and-plans#spend-alert)

Open **Usage** and enter an amount under **Spend alert**, then select **Save**. up4 sends one email when the month's usage crosses it. An amount of 0 turns the alert off.

[![](https://upfour.io/docs/images/walk/en/credit-and-plans-spend-alert.webp)](https://upfour.io/docs/images/walk/en/credit-and-plans-spend-alert.webp)

### 5. [Change a plan or cancel](https://upfour.io/docs/credit-and-plans#change)

Once you have a plan, the billing page shows a subscription card. On it, switching from monthly to yearly and from Team to Agency apply at once, with a preview first. Every other change, such as **Switch to Team**, applies when the paid period ends.

To cancel, select **Open billing portal**. The card then shows **Cancellation scheduled**. After the paid period the Company continues as pay as you go with its balance.

### 6. [Find invoices and receipts](https://upfour.io/docs/credit-and-plans#invoices)

Select **Receipts and invoices in the customer portal** on the subscription card, or **Open receipts** for top-ups. Both open Stripe's customer portal. They appear after the first payment: before it, the top-up card only says where receipts will be, and the subscription card is missing until you have a plan.

## When the credit runs out

up4 warns the Company owner by email before it happens. On pay as you go the warnings come at about 14, 7, 3 and 1 day of balance left, judged by your recent usage. What follows depends on whether the Company has paid before.

| Situation | What happens |
| --- | --- |
| **Starting credit used up, never paid** | Checks pause at once. The email you get says so. A top-up or a plan resumes monitoring. |
| **Balance used up after a first payment** | Grace mode. For 7 days every monitor keeps running, now every 5 minutes, free of charge. Alerts and status pages stay live. A few actions are narrower; see [grace mode limits](https://upfour.io/docs/reference/limits#grace). |
| **After grace mode** | Checks pause. A top-up resumes them. Scheduled-job check-ins are ignored while paused. |
| **Subscription payment fails** | The same grace mode runs. The page shows **Payment failed**; select **Fix payment** to update the card. |

A pause never deletes monitors, pages or settings. The balance never goes negative, and up4 does not chase you for payment.

## How you know it worked

After a top-up the **Balance** shows the new amount and **Transactions** lists it as **Top-up**.

After choosing a plan the subscription card shows **Active** with the plan and its interval, and **Monthly check budget** shows how much of the included usage you have used.

## If something is off

The checkout does not open.

The page shows an error with Message us, which starts a message with the details filled in. A plan button that says Temporarily unavailable cannot start a checkout right now; try again later.

The page says Payment failed.

Select Fix payment and update the card. Monitoring continues in grace mode meanwhile.

New monitors are blocked on a plan.

The monthly check budget is used up. Running monitors keep their interval. New monitors, shorter intervals and more regions wait for the next month, a larger plan or an [add-on](https://upfour.io/docs/reference/limits#addons).

## What up4 does not do here

- up4 charges your card only when you confirm a top-up, a plan or an add-on, or after you switch on auto-reload.
- The monthly minimum is settled when the month closes, prorated by day in the sign-up month. It never takes the balance below zero.
- The check budget of a plan renews with the UTC calendar month. Estimates on the page count a month as 30 days.
- No overage is charged on a plan. When the budget is used up, only new load is blocked.