Billing and plans

A plan pays for real sites. Each plan has site slots, and every real site uses one slot of one plan. An account can hold more than one plan, so you can add a plan when the ones you have are full. Test sites are always free and use no slot.

Cards are typed into Stripe's card fields on Avaloi's own page. The card number goes straight to Stripe; Avaloi never sees or stores it. See Payment methods.

Start a plan

1. Open Settings, then Billing, and select Start a plan. When you already have a plan, the button says Add a plan.
2. Region. Pick the region first, such as Ashburn, Virginia. Each region has its own prices, and the plan's sites go in that region. See Region prices and the shared node credit.
3. Plan step. Pick monthly or annual billing, then pick a plan card. Each card shows the region's price, such as "$84 a month in Ashburn, Virginia", with the note "Never goes up. You get up to $12.60 back each month when this region is busy." It also shows the number of WordPress sites (the site slots), the visits, the disk, and the staging environments. Enterprise has no card price: it is billed on a custom invoice, so the card says to contact sales.
4. Summary step. The New plan details card shows the plan, the price, the subtotal, the tax line, and the total. The Payment method card shows your default card. Select Add new card to save another one without leaving the modal.
5. Read the auto-renew note: the plan renews every month or year on your default card until you cancel it.
6. Select Subscribe. The price you see is locked: it never goes up while the plan is active.

After you pay, the modal says Payment received, setting up your plan while Stripe confirms the payment. This usually takes a few seconds. If the plan has not appeared after a minute, the modal says so and offers Refresh. Your payment is safe; the plan shows as soon as Stripe's confirmation arrives.

If your bank asks you to confirm the payment (3D Secure), its check opens in the page. Finish it and the plan starts as usual.

Your first plan on an account gets the first month free when the plan offers it. A second plan is paid from the first day.

The tax line

The Summary shows the tax Stripe works out for your billing address. While tax collection is off for Avaloi's Stripe account, the line reads Tax (not charged) and shows $0.00.

Add a site on a plan

When you add a real site, pick the region first. The Plan list then shows every plan for that region that still has a free slot, such as "Business 1, 3 of 5 slots free". The site uses one slot of the plan you pick.

When no plan has a free slot, pick Buy a new plan and select Continue to plan. The Start a plan steps run inside the same modal, and the site is created on the new plan as soon as it is ready. Only Owners, Admins, and Billing members can buy a plan. Other roles see a note to ask one of them.

Limits for a site (disk, staging environments, PHP workers, and the like) come from the plan it is on. Account features, such as the number of members and API keys, follow the largest plan on the account.

See your plans

The My plan tab lists every plan: its region, its locked price, its billing period, how many slots it uses ("2 of 5 used"), its renewal date, its status, and its last shared node credit. Invoices lists every invoice, and Usage shows this period's usage.

Cancel a plan

Select Cancel on the plan's row, choose whether it ends now or at the end of the billing period, and confirm. A plan with sites on it cannot be cancelled. Move those sites to another plan or delete them first. Within 30 days of your first payment, the plan's hosting charges are refunded in full.

Closing a business cancels every plan it holds.

For scripts and agents

• GET /v1/billing/subscriptions lists the plans with site_slots, sites_used, free_slots, and accepts_sites.
• GET /v1/billing/quote?region=us-east4&plan=business_1 returns the region's price for a plan. See Region prices.
• GET /v1/billing/plan-preview?lookup_key=plan_business_1_monthly&region=us-east4 returns the Summary numbers.
• POST /v1/billing/subscriptions starts a plan on the default card, for the region you send (the default region otherwise). It needs confirm: true and the billing:write scope. When the bank asks for 3D Secure, the answer has requires_action: true, and a person finishes the payment in the dashboard.
• POST /v1/billing/subscriptions/{id}/cancel cancels one plan. It answers 409 with the code plan_has_sites while sites use it.
• POST /v1/sites takes an optional subscription_id. Without it, the one plan with a free slot is used. Otherwise the API answers 402 with a code: no_free_plan_slot (buy a new plan), choose_plan (more than one plan has a free slot; the detail names them), or plan_unavailable (the named plan is full or ended).
• PATCH /v1/sites/{id} with subscription_id moves a site to another plan with a free slot. It needs billing access as well as permission to update the site.

Not yet

• Moving a site to another plan from the dashboard. Use the API for now.
• Changing a plan in place from the dashboard. Add the new plan, move the sites, and cancel the old plan.

Quick answers

Why do I see 402 when I add a site? No plan has a free slot. Buy a new plan for the site, or create a free test site.

Can I have two plans of the same kind? Yes. Each plan adds its own site slots.

Will my test site use a slot? No. Test sites are free and run on a simulated server.

Related

• Region prices and the shared node credit
• Payment methods
• Payment failed
• Account types
• Sites list and bulk actions
• API errors