Billing FAQ

Questions about what your organization pays Suger for using Insulin. For billing the customers you sell to, see Billing. For help, contact support@suger.io.

Credit

How much free credit do we get?

$100 each month, granted on the 1st. Some accounts have a different recurring amount arranged with Suger — the Credit table on Settings → Billing always shows the real figure for your organization.

Does unused free credit roll over?

No. Monthly free credit expires at the end of the month it was issued in. Credit you paid for is different: it stays valid for three years.

We have several credits. Which one is spent first?

The one expiring soonest. So the monthly free credit is used before credit you paid for, and paid credit is not wasted while free credit sits unused. The Credit table shows each grant, what is left of it, and when it expires.

Can we buy credit in the console?

Not directly. Credit is added by automatic top-up against a saved payment method, or granted by Suger. Contact support@suger.io to arrange a one-off purchase.

Can we get a refund on credit we paid for?

Contact support. Unspent credit can be reversed; credit already consumed cannot, and support can tell you which is which before anything is refunded. Refunds are issued in Stripe and then reflected on the account.

Usage and cost

How is AI usage measured?

Input and output tokens are counted separately, per model and provider, and tagged with who or what caused them. Sandboxes bill processor, memory and storage independently. Object storage is sampled daily. What is metered has the detail.

Why is the usage table empty when the balance went down?

The usage breakdown is re-aggregated every couple of hours; the balance moves within about a minute. The usage will appear shortly. If the two disagree, the balance is the current one.

We deleted everything. Why are we still billed for storage?

Object storage is billed on the highest volume held on any single day of the month. Deleting reduces next month’s peak, not this month’s. The capacity was reserved on the day you used it, and the supplier charged for it then.

We stopped a sandbox. Why is it still costing money?

Stopping releases processor and memory but not the volume, which is still reserved for you — and the sandbox provider keeps charging Suger for it. Delete the sandbox to stop the storage charge.

Are failed requests billed?

Yes. The provider charges Suger for work it performed, whether or not the answer reached you.

Is cached context billed?

Yes, in full, as input tokens. Providers charge for cached context even when they serve it from cache. Today it is priced at the same rate as fresh input.

Are we charged for AI that Suger runs itself?

No. Platform features that use a model internally — summarization, search indexing, embeddings, reranking, field mapping — are Suger’s cost. Only your use of Insulin is billed.

What happens if we use a model Suger has no price for?

It is still billed, at a documented fallback: a supplier cost of $5.00 per million input tokens and $10.00 per million output tokens, plus the standard 50% margin — so $7.50 and $15.00 per million as charged. Newly released models are the usual case. Consumption is never dropped for want of a price.

What currency, and is tax included?

US dollars only, and amounts exclude tax — the billing platform does not calculate it.

Bring your own key (BYOK)

How does billing change if we use our own provider key?

The provider bills you directly for the tokens under your own contract, and Suger charges a flat fee per unit rather than a percentage of a cost it does not incur. The platform still routes, meters and secures every request.

We use our own key. Why were we blocked at a zero balance?

Because the per-unit fee is still owed. A zero balance pauses AI requests on pay as you go whether the tokens were bought with Suger’s key or your own.

Limits and interruptions

Why did AI stop for our organization?

One of four reasons, named in the banner on Settings → Billing: a suspension, your own monthly spending limit, an exhausted balance, or the account’s debt limit. When AI pauses explains each and how it resolves.

We topped up and it is still blocked. Why?

Almost always because the banner names your monthly spending limit rather than your balance. A limit is compared against what you have spent this month, not against your credit, so topping up changes nothing. Raise or remove the limit on the same page.

Do our files or sandboxes get deleted when credit runs out?

Never. Stored files stay readable and running sandboxes keep running. Past the account’s debt limit, new sandboxes and new uploads also stop — but nothing existing is deleted.

How quickly does service resume after adding credit?

About a minute or two, automatically. No operator action is needed.

Can we set a limit that warns without blocking?

No. The monthly spending limit blocks when it is reached. To avoid reaching zero at all, use automatic top-up.

Invoices and payment

When are we invoiced, and what does the invoice collect?

Periods close on the 1st of the following month, and an invoice is issued for the closed period. What it collects depends on the billing model:

• Pay as you go — nothing, in the normal case. The usage was already paid for as it happened, out of a credit balance you had funded, so the invoice is a statement. The exception is a balance that ended the month below zero, which is collected.
• Monthly billing — the period’s metered total, with any credit you hold applied against it on the document.

Two things can stop an invoice being issued. Invoicing is enabled per account by Suger, and nothing is issued before it is — but pay-as-you-go usage still comes off your credit balance as it happens, so “no invoice yet” does not mean “free”. An amount to collect below the payment provider’s $0.50 minimum is also carried into a later period rather than charged.

Where do we see past invoices?

Not in the console — there is no invoice list on the billing page. Contact support@suger.io for a copy of an invoice.

What happens if a payment fails?

Stripe retries up to four times on its own schedule. Nothing happens to the account during the retries. Once they are exhausted, a pay-as-you-go organization is suspended and notified; a monthly-billing organization is notified and Suger’s team follows up, with no automatic cut-off. A suspension is not lifted automatically by a later successful payment — contact Suger to have it cleared.

Do we need a payment method to use Insulin?

No. The monthly free credit is spendable without one. You need a saved method to turn on automatic top-up, and monthly billing requires one.

Can we change between pay as you go and monthly billing?

Contact Suger. The change takes effect at the start of the next month, not immediately, and unused purchased credit carries across it.

Access

Who in our organization can see the billing page?

Any member of a seller, reseller, or partner organization. Settings → Billing is not restricted to administrators, and there is no admin-only view within it.

Can we reach it from inside Insulin?

Yes — the Settings app on the Insulin desktop shows the same Billing tab as the console. The in-app assistant can also take you there if you ask it about billing or spend.