LiveAgent invoicing explained

Home > Billing & payments support > LiveAgent invoicing explained

Quick navigation

Our invoices might seem complicated at first, but once you understand the key points there should be no doubt about how it works. The main thing to understand is that you always pay only for the real usage of your account. There are no hidden fees, all extra paid features are listed on our pricing page. The billing system works based on a forward fee for usage paid upfront.

For example, if your LiveAgent plan costs $49 per month per agent and during your current billing cycle you'll add 5 additional agents just for 1 week before your next billing cycle, you will pay only an aliquot payment for this usage. Therefore, you wouldn't pay additionally the full monthly price of $245 for 5 agents, but only $57.17. See more examples and explanations below.

Additional charges outside of your billing day

By default payments for LiveAgent accounts can be done on a monthly or yearly basis. Apart from these monthly/yearly payments, there are a few actions adjusting your account usage that might trigger additional charges outside of your billing day. These actions won't move your billing day and won't start a new billing period.

After raising your account usage (adding new agents or additionally paid addons that are not already included in your plan, or upgrading your plan to a higher one) the system recalculates the price for usage of your LiveAgent account. During the recalculation, there is a check if the new amount is at least 10% higher than the already paid amount and at the same time at least $20 higher than the already paid amount for the current billing period. If both these conditions are met, it results in requesting an additional payment, and an email notification about the new usage and additional payment is sent to the email address set up in the LiveAgent account billing details. After that, there is a 3 days window during which you can decide to keep the new usage, or adjust it further. After these 3 days, another confirmation recalculation is done, and if both the 10% and $20 conditions are still met and the system evaluates that the additional payment is still required, you will be charged for the new usage. On your next billing day, an invoice will be calculated based on your new usage.

If such an additional payment fails (e.g. due to insufficient funds) the system will try to charge the amount every 24 hours until the charge will be successful, or until a new billing period starts. If the system won't be able to charge you before the new billing period starts, the invoice for the additional payment will be closed and the required amount will be instead added to the next invoice on your next billing day.

If one or both of the conditions are not met an additional payment won't be required, and the difference will be charged in the next invoice on the next billing day. Such additional charges on the next billing day can be seen also in the Current summary in the My Account section.

  1. Today is the 1st day of the month (1.1.) and your current billing period is set to the 15th day of the month (15.1.). If you are currently on the Medium plan with 5 agents that costs $29/agent, your current monthly cost (pre-paid on 15.12.) is $145. Adding 7 new agents today will trigger the additional payment outside the regular billing, because the amount makes 70% of the pre-paid usage and at the same time $101.5, therefore both the 10% and $20 conditions were met. An email notification will be sent and the difference of $101.5 for 7 agents for half of a month will be charged in 3 days (4.1.).

  2. Today is the 1st day of the month (1.1.) and your current billing period is set to the 15th day of the month (15.1.). If you are currently on the Medium plan with 5 agents that costs $29/agent, your current monthly cost (pre-paid on 15.12.) is $145. Upgrading today to the Large plan will trigger the additional payment outside the regular billing, because the amount makes 84.5% of the pre-paid usage and at the same time $122.5, therefore both the 10% and $20 conditions were met. An email notification will be sent and the difference of $122.5 for the Large plan for half of a month will be charged in 3 days (4.1.).

  3. Today is the 1st day of the month (1.1.) and your current billing period is set to the 15th day of the month (15.1.). If you are currently on the Medium plan with 5 agents that costs $29/agent, your current monthly cost (pre-paid on 15.12.) is $145. Adding 1 new agent today won't trigger the additional payment outside the regular billing, because despite the amount being 10% of the pre-paid usage, the additional usage counted from 1.1. to 15.1. still makes $14.5, therefore the $20 condition was not met. An email notification won't be sent and the difference of $14.5 for 1 agent for half of a month will be charged on your next billing day 15.1.

  4. Today is the 1st day of the month (1.1.) and your current billing period is set to the 15th day of the month (15.1.). If you are currently on the Small plan with 1 agent that costs $9/agent, your current monthly cost (pre-paid on 15.12.) is $9. Upgrading today to the Medium plan won't trigger the additional payment outside the regular billing, because despite the amount being 161% of the pre-paid usage, the additional usage counted from 1.1. to 15.1. still makes $14.5, therefore the $20 condition was not met. An email notification won't be sent and the difference of $14.5 for the Medium plan for half of a month will be charged on your next billing day 15.1.

  5. Today is the 1st day of the month (1.1.) and your current billing period is set to the 15th day of the month (15.1.). If you are currently on the Small plan with 5 agents that costs $9/agent, your current monthly cost (pre-paid on 15.12.) is $45. Adding 7 new agents today but removing 5 of them 2 days later won't trigger the additional payment outside the regular billing, because on the 1st recalculation on 1.1. the amount made 70% of the pre-paid usage and at the same time $31.5, therefore both the 10% and $20 conditions were met, but on the 2nd confirmation recalculation 3 days later, despite the amount made 27% of the pre-paid usage, the additional usage counted from 1.1. to 15.1. still makes $12.0, therefore the $20 condition was not met. An email notification won't be sent and the difference of $12.0 for 5 agents for 2 days and 2 agents for half of a month will be charged on your next billing day 15.1.

Removing agents/addons/downgrading the plan

When you remove existing agents or additionally paid addons that are not already included in your plan or downgrade your plan to a lower one, the system recalculates the price for usage of your LiveAgent account. As you've already pre-paid your monthly usage, the difference won't be refunded, but will be instead included as an extra credit in your next payment.

It is not possible to change your subscription plan 24 hours before your next billing day.

The extra credit is not displayed in the My Account section as a negative "To pay" value in the Current summary section, it will be visible only in the next monthly/yearly summary.

  1. Today is the 1st day of the month (1.1.) and your current billing period is set to the 15th day of the month (15.1.). If you are currently on the Medium plan with 10 agents that costs $29/agent, your current monthly cost (pre-paid on 15.12.) is $290. Removing 5 agents today for the rest of the billing period will provide you with a $72.5 credit that will be deducted from your next payment on your next billing day (15.2.).

  2. Today is the 1st day of the month (1.1.) and your current billing period is set to the 15th day of the month (15.1.). If you are currently on the Large plan with 10 agents that costs $49/agent, your current monthly cost (pre-paid on 15.12.) is $490. Downgrading today to the Medium plan for the rest of the billing period will provide you with a $100 credit that will be deducted from your next payment on your next billing day (15.2.).

Change of the billing day

Customers on the Enterprise plan have the option to choose the day of the month when they will be charged for their LiveAgent accounts. From the billing perspective, after changing the billing day, once your current billing period ends the new billing period will be calculated as 1 month + the number of days until the new chosen billing day.

Change of the billing day is available only for customers on the Enterprise plan and can be done only by our team. If you want to move your billing day, please contact our support.

  1. Today is the 10th day of the month (10.1.) and your current billing period is set to the 15th day of the month (15.1.). After changing the billing day to the 25th day of the month, your current period still ends on the 15th day of the month (15.1.), and your new billing period will be set from the 15th day of the current month (15.1.) until the 25th day of the next month (25.2.).

  2. Today is the 15th day of the month (15.1.) and your current billing period is set to the 20th day of the month (20.1.). After changing the billing day to the 5th day of the month, your current period still ends on the 20th day of the month (20.1.), and your new billing period will be set from the 20th day of the current month (20.1.) until the 5th day of the next month (5.3.).

Monthly/yearly summary

After your current billing period ends, a PDF file with your account's usage summary will be sent to the email address set up in the LiveAgent account billing details. The breakdown of the current usage can be also found in the My Account section.

Although the summary is always generated in $, for EU customers the price on the invoice is re-calculated and charged in € based on the actual exchange rate on the billing day.

 

Updated:

Other Articles

×