# Billing > How a monthly plan ($10 to $1,000, or sized to your boxes past that) becomes credit, what boxes cost by the hour, and what happens when the credit runs out. URL: https://prized.dev/docs/billing ## How it works [#how-it-works] A plan, any rung from $10 to $1,000 a month, lands at least that much credit every cycle; every box meters against it by the second, quoted by the hour: | Box state | Rate | | --------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Awake | Its monthly price spread over a 730 hour month: a Small is $100 a month, so $0.137 an hour. | | Asleep | $0.0001 per GB hour of the disk the box actually has; a Small asleep for a month is about $22. A box that kept a bigger disk pays that rate on the extra disk, asleep or awake. | * **Pausing keeps the money.** Pause from the dashboard or with [auto-pause](https://prized.dev/docs/boxes#auto-pause); `prized ssh` wakes the box. * **A box that failed to launch costs nothing.** It meters at zero until you delete it; usage from before a later failure still counts. * **Credit rolls over** up to two months of your plan; the excess lapses when a cycle's credit lands, as its own line in your activity. Top-up and free credit are spared that trim for two months after they land. * **Each rung runs one size around the clock:** $10 a Nano, $100 a Small, $1,000 an Extra Large. The credit spends on any mix. * **Long cycles land more credit.** Rates assume 730 hours; a calendar cycle of up to 744 lands proportionally more, at no extra charge. * **A fleet bigger than the biggest rung** gets a plan sized exactly to it: an Extra Large plus a Small is a $1,100/mo plan. ## Free credit [#free-credit] New workspaces get $30 of free credit, once, as the owner walks through onboarding; it spends like paid credit, and the tour starts a box on it with no card. It does not refill: at zero, boxes pause ([Running out](#running-out)) and the dashboard opens on the plan picker. Choosing a plan keeps what is left, and the first cycle's credit lands at once. While the workspace runs on the free credit alone: | Rule | Detail | | ----------------------------------------------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Nano, Micro, Extra Small, or Small only | Medium and larger need a plan (on the credit alone, the API answers `409 tier_unavailable`): pick the size (and a region) on the tour or the create form, start its plan, and the box launches there once the first cycle's credit lands. A create that names no size gets a Small. Around the clock, the credit lasts about three months on a Nano, five weeks on a Micro, nine days on a Small (or 19 nights at eight hours awake a day). | | Boxes never pause themselves | [Auto-pause](https://prized.dev/docs/boxes#auto-pause) is a plan feature, so nothing stops mid-work: setting a window answers `409 trial_no_auto_pause`. Pause the box yourself from the dashboard or with `prized box pause`. | | One box at a time | A second create (from the dashboard, `prized box new`, a restore, or a fork) answers `409 box_limit`; delete the box to free the slot. A plan raises the cap to the usual 100. | | No process at full CPU for more than 30 minutes | One process holding the whole box at full CPU that long pauses the workspace's boxes, and creating or waking one answers `409 workspace_held` with the reason. Builds, tests, agents and single-threaded jobs do not trip it; a long job that fills every core belongs on a plan, and starting one lifts the pause at once. | All four lift the moment a plan is live; a box started on the credit keeps its settings, and you can then set its idle timer. ## Sizes and rates [#sizes-and-rates] The live shape and price table is at https://prized.dev/pricing. The last column is the most a box can cost in a month, and the plan that runs it around the clock. The [pricing page](https://prized.dev/pricing) compares renting the same machine elsewhere. ## Choosing and changing the plan [#choosing-and-changing-the-plan] The owner picks a plan on the Billing page, or on the tour's payment step once the [free credit](#free-credit) is spent. Payment is Stripe Checkout, cards only, and the first cycle's credit lands before you are back; with no box yet, choosing a plan starts one at the size that rung runs around the clock, in the region picked with it (Oregon if none). | Change | Effect | | --------- | --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Upgrade | Starts a fresh cycle today: a full month of the new plan, minus the unused share of the old one, bills now and lands as credit. Your renewal date resets. | | Downgrade | Changes what the next cycle bills, on your existing renewal date; this cycle's credit stays yours. | | Cancel | Stops the plan at the period's end; credit already landed works until spent. Pick a plan again before then and it keeps renewing. | Past $1,000/mo the ladder grows one more rung, sized to your boxes. The balance and plan belong to the [workspace](https://prized.dev/docs/workspaces): everyone spends the same balance and can see the Billing page; only the owner changes the plan, buys top-ups, switches overage, or opens the Stripe portal. ## Topping up [#topping-up] The owner can buy one-time top-ups on the Billing page: $10 to $250 by card, as often as needed, in your balance right away and never changing what the plan bills. With [overage](#overage) on, you need none. ## When we tell you [#when-we-tell-you] * **Dashboard banner** when less than two days of credit remain at the current rate; others in overage, after boxes were suspended, while a renewal is being collected or a payment is failing, and before the account is funded. * **`prized status`** prints a credit line when the balance is running low or empty, and says whether boxes keep running (overage, a renewal collecting, or a failed renewal's grace). * **Email** to the workspace's address and every owner, at a quarter and a tenth of what the last cycle left you, and once each on crossing into overage, on boxes pausing, and on a failed payment; at most two reminders if you never started a plan. ## Overage [#overage] **Off by default:** out of credit means boxes pause, and nothing bills past what you put in. The owner can switch it on from the Billing page, and running out then stops nothing: | Case | What happens | | -------------------------------------------------- | ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- | | Usage past zero | Bills at the same hourly rates, as its own line on your next invoice, no markup. Prepaid credit always spends first; new credit (a top-up, an upgrade, the next cycle) pays overage down first. | | You turn it off | The balance is the hard stop again; overage already run up still bills with your next invoice, or a final one if the plan ends first. | | A failed or disputed payment | Switches overage off until a payment collects. A failed renewal still keeps boxes running for seven days ([Failed payments](#failed-payments)). | | A cancelled plan | Its negative balance bills once, on a final invoice; a tail under Stripe's 50 cent minimum is written off. | | A refund, a reversed payment, or a correction | Never charged as overage, even if it makes the balance negative: only metered compute bills as overage. | | A dispute of the payment that settled your overage | Puts the balance, and the overage owed on it, back where they were. | ## Running out [#running-out] With overage off, without a plan, or while a payment is failing past its [grace](#failed-payments), the balance is the hard stop: at zero, boxes suspend. Disks are kept, with your work, installed tools, and git state. Boxes the stop paused start again on their own once the next cycle, an upgrade, a top-up, or overage can run them for four hours; a box you woke, paused, or deleted since is left as you left it. Suspended boxes meter their disk at the sleep rate, and usage the balance cannot cover is written off, never turned into a debt. **Renewal day is not running out.** A renewal takes about an hour to collect, so a plan that reaches zero after it renews pauses nothing until the payment goes through, for up to six hours, and that time bills from the new cycle's credit. If the payment fails, the seven-day grace under [Failed payments](#failed-payments) takes over; if the six hours end with neither, your boxes pause. Usage recorded during the wait keeps its running rate and is paid from your next credit, not charged as overage. An unpaid upgrade does not extend this renewal window or delay suspension at zero. If a box stays paused after funds return, resume it yourself. A pause whose intent is uncertain is never undone automatically. > Nothing is deleted automatically. If a balance stays empty for a long time, we contact you before any disk is released. ## Starting and resizing boxes [#starting-and-resizing-boxes] With [overage](#overage) off, a create, a wake, or a resize needs enough balance to run the resulting fleet for four hours, counting every box at the disk it actually has; while a renewal collects or a failed renewal is in its [grace](#failed-payments), a box from the fleet already running when collection began can be woken without that balance unless failed-launch cleanup is still reserving allowance. Waking a previously parked box with credit and pausing it again does not add it to that protected fleet. A box paused before its first start still needs normal funding. It is a check, not a charge: a refusal says what the fleet would burn and what the balance would need. A resize meters at the new rate at once; a box mid-change cannot be resized until it settles. A failed launch still reserves its allowance until its cleanup finishes, even if you delete it. That reservation is not billed, but it still counts against box limits and [member policy limits](https://prized.dev/docs/teams#policies). A failed box cannot be resized. While it is pending and overage is off, even a wake during renewal collection or payment grace needs the full four hours of fleet allowance; add credit or wait for cleanup. A region move keeps the hourly rate but copies the whole disk, so it needs a funded balance ([Regions](https://prized.dev/docs/boxes#regions)). Its caps, and every other, are on [Limits](https://prized.dev/docs/limits). When a new or resized box would cost more around the clock than your plan puts in each month, the owner is offered the covering plan (with no plan yet, a first one). **Resize** offers it as one extra click, quoting the charge due today, and declining just resizes; **Create** pre-selects it, and unchecking creates on your current plan. Nothing charges without the page saying so first, and the prepaid balance is the only thing that gates a box. ## Failed payments [#failed-payments] A failed renewal of a plan that has paid before keeps your boxes running for seven days from the first failure, whatever the balance reads; the banner, the Billing page, `prized status`, and the email name the minute it ends. Overage is off meanwhile, so nothing more goes past zero: the time the boxes run waits, at the rate it ran, for the payment to cover. A box that was running at renewal can be woken again after a pause; a box already asleep before renewal, new boxes, and resizes need enough credit. These wakes still need the [failed-launch cleanup allowance](#starting-and-resizing-boxes). Stripe retries the card on its own schedule; the owner updates it in the Stripe portal, linked from the Billing page, and the charge retries on its own. Paid, nothing changes; still unpaid after seven days, or the plan cancelled, the balance is the hard stop again and boxes pause at zero. Any other failed payment (an upgrade's charge, or a plan's first) suspends nothing by itself: boxes keep running on what remains, and pause at zero. Fully refunded or reversed plan payments do not qualify for renewal grace. A refund of your last qualifying plan payment ends that grace. A refund, or a payment your card issuer pulls back (a dispute), takes the credit it bought out of the balance; a dispute also pauses the plan's billing and switches overage off while it stands. Won, the credit is restored, billing resumes, and overage returns with your next successful payment; lost, the plan is cancelled and overage stays off until you pick a plan again. ## Receipts [#receipts] Every cycle produces a Stripe invoice you can download. The Billing page's recent activity lists each cycle's credit and one usage line per hour; card details, invoices, and receipts are in the Stripe portal, linked there for the owner. ## Custom plans [#custom-plans] A fleet bigger than the largest rung needs no special deal: the plan sizes itself to your boxes ([above](#choosing-and-changing-the-plan)). For a startup deal or a negotiated amount, email the support address shown on https://prized.dev/docs/troubleshooting for a link (it expires after 30 days) the owner opens to subscribe at that amount in one click, or to move an existing plan; it then behaves like any other plan. A custom plan also unlocks [zero data retention](https://prized.dev/docs/data-retention#zero-data-retention).