---
title: Billing & Quotas
description: >-
  Resolve quota errors, payment failures, credit usage, and overage alerts on
  the platform.
tags:
  - troubleshooting
  - billing
---

Each job type has a per-run credit cost. The platform checks your balance before it dispatches a job, and your plan caps how many jobs run at once. Use this page when a job is rejected for cost, a payment is declined, or usage is throttled. Most fixes are on the [Billing page](/profile/billing) or in the `ivybloom billing` and `ivybloom credits` commands.

## Common error messages

| Message | Meaning | Resolution |
|---------|---------|------------|
| `Quota exceeded` | Your plan's limits have been reached for jobs, storage, or seats. | Check usage on the Billing page. Upgrade your plan or wait for the next billing cycle. |
| `Payment failed` | Your credit card was declined or has expired. | Update your payment method in Billing then Payment. |
| `Overage warning` | Usage has exceeded soft limits. Jobs may be throttled. | Reduce active jobs or upgrade to a higher tier. |
| `Insufficient credits` | You do not have enough credits to run the requested tool. | Purchase additional credits or wait for monthly replenishment. |

## Credit consumption by tier

Credits are the platform's unit of consumption. Each job type carries its own per-run credit cost, so a GPU folding run costs more than a database lookup.

### Tool tier credit costs

The per-run cost of every job type is stored server-side and served by `GET /api/v1/jobs/pricing`. Check a tool's cost there, or in the job's cost field after it runs, rather than from a fixed table: costs change as hardware and models change.

### How credits are calculated

- **Per-job billing.** Each job is charged its job type's per-run cost.
- **Credit check before execution.** The platform checks your balance before it dispatches a job. If you don't have enough credits, the job is rejected before it runs.

### Factors that affect credit consumption

- **Input size.** Docking a single compound costs fewer credits than docking 100 compounds in a batch.
- **Batch multiplier.** Batch jobs apply a per-item credit cost. A batch of 50 docking jobs at 10 credits each costs 500 credits. There is no discount for batching.
- **Tool parameters.** Some tools have options that increase computation. For example, increasing the number of docking poses from 5 to 20 increases the credit cost proportionally.
- **Retries.** Retrying a failed job consumes credits again. Credits for the original failed job are not refunded automatically; see [Credit consumption for failed jobs](#credit-consumption-for-failed-jobs) for how to request a review.

## Unexpected credit usage

If your credit balance dropped more than expected, check these common causes.

**Batch job multiplier:**
- A batch of N items costs N times the per-item credit rate. If you submitted a batch of 200 ADMET predictions at 2 credits each, that is 400 credits.
- Check the job detail page for the "Credit cost" field to see the exact charge for any job.

**Failed jobs still consume credits:**
- If a job was assigned to a worker and began executing before it failed, credits are consumed. This is because GPU time was used.
- Jobs that fail during validation (before execution) do not consume credits.
- See [Credit consumption for failed jobs](#credit-consumption-for-failed-jobs) below for recourse on execution failures.

**Thinking mode in chat:**
- Extended thinking gives the model a reasoning budget before it answers: 5,000 tokens in "auto" mode and 8,000 when thinking is "on". Those tokens count toward your AI usage.
- If chat usage is climbing quickly, set thinking to "off" or "auto" for simple queries.

**Automated workflows:**
- If you set up automated pipelines that submit jobs on triggers, those jobs consume credits like any manual submission. Review your active workflows on the Projects page.

**Viewing credit history:**
- Open the [Billing page](/profile/billing), or run `ivybloom credits history` for a line-by-line breakdown of credit consumption.
- `ivybloom credits export` writes the same history to a file you can filter.

## Subscription tiers

Each plan sets your monthly credits, how many jobs you can run at once, which model families you can reach, and how much of the compute-tool catalog you can run. [Plans and tiers](/docs/plans-and-tiers) walks through what each plan unlocks, and [pricing](/pricing) carries the current numbers. If this page and pricing disagree, pricing is correct.

### Changing tiers

- Upgrades take effect immediately. You are charged the prorated difference for the current billing period. Your new monthly credits are added on top of any remaining credits.
- Downgrades take effect at the end of the current billing period. You retain the higher tier's benefits until then.
- Unused credits do not roll over between months. On the monthly renewal date, your balance resets to the tier's allocation.
- Mid-cycle tier changes are allowed. You can upgrade and downgrade multiple times within a billing period.

## Payment method issues

**Card declined:**
1. Verify the card has not expired. Payment methods are managed in the Stripe customer portal, which you can open from the Billing page or with `ivybloom billing portal`.
2. Ensure the billing address matches what your bank has on file.
3. Check with your bank for fraud blocks. International transactions from Stripe may trigger fraud alerts.
4. Try a different card if the issue persists.
5. Some banks require pre-authorization for recurring subscriptions. Contact your bank to authorize charges from "Ivy Biosciences" or "Stripe."

**Invoice payment (enterprise):**
- Enterprise customers on invoice billing receive invoices on the first of each month.
- Net 30 payment terms apply. If payment is overdue by more than 15 days, the account may be throttled.
- Contact your account manager for payment disputes or alternative arrangements.

**Currency:**
- All prices are in USD. Currency conversion is handled by your payment provider at their prevailing rate.
- No additional currency conversion fees are charged by Ivy Biosciences.

## Invoice and receipt access

- **Invoices.** Open them from the [Billing page](/profile/billing) or list them with `ivybloom billing invoices`. Each billing period has a downloadable PDF invoice.
- **Receipts.** Successful payments generate a receipt email to the billing contact. Receipts are also available on the Invoices page.
- **Usage breakdown.** For a job-by-job breakdown of credit use, run `ivybloom credits history` or `ivybloom credits export`.
- **Export for accounting.** Use the "Export to CSV" button on the Invoices page to download a machine-readable transaction history for a date range.
- **Tax documentation.** Ivy Biosciences does not charge sales tax in most jurisdictions. If your organization requires a W-9 or tax exemption certificate, contact support.

## Credit alerts

Keep an eye on your balance before it runs out.

**Where the warnings appear:**
- The chat's usage indicator warns you as your rolling 7-day spend climbs past set levels.
- `ivybloom credits summary` prints your balance, and `ivybloom credits trends` shows how fast you're spending it.

**Storing alert thresholds:**
1. Run `ivybloom credits alerts show` to see your saved thresholds.
2. Save new ones with `ivybloom credits alerts set`.

⚠︎ The platform stores these thresholds but doesn't send emails on them yet, so check your balance yourself before a large batch.

**When the balance runs out:**
- New job submissions are rejected until you buy credits or your plan renews.

## Credit consumption for failed jobs

Credits are consumed as follows:

**Credit hold at submission:**
- When you submit a job, the estimated cost is reserved (held) from your balance. The hold is released if the submission is rejected before the job begins executing.
- Jobs rejected at the submission gate (invalid input, insufficient credits, authentication issues) do not consume credits.

**Credit consumption:**
- Once a job is dispatched and begins executing, credits are consumed whether the job succeeds or fails.
- A platform failure (worker crash, infrastructure timeout) consumes credits the same as a successful job.

**If you believe a charge was in error:**
- Submit a support ticket with the Job ID, the error code, a timestamp, and an explanation of why you believe it should not have been charged.
- Include what you expected to happen instead.
- Support reviews refund requests within 2 business days. Refunds are granted at support's discretion for platform errors only.

**Not eligible for refund:**
- Jobs that failed due to invalid input (wrong SMILES, corrupt PDB, malformed parameters).
- Jobs that completed successfully but produced unexpected results.
- Jobs cancelled by you after execution began.
- Chat token consumption (AI model usage is non-refundable).

## Purchasing additional credits

If you exhaust your monthly allocation before the renewal date, you can purchase additional credits.

- **Credit packs.** Buy them on the [Billing page](/profile/billing) or with `ivybloom billing buy-tokens`. The pack sizes on offer come from Stripe, so check the Billing page for the current list.
- **Pricing.** Credit pack pricing is the same regardless of your subscription tier.
- **Immediate availability.** Purchased credits are added to your balance within 1 minute of payment confirmation.
- **No expiration.** Purchased credit packs do not expire at the end of the billing cycle. They carry over until used.
- **Organization credits.** On Team and Enterprise plans, purchased credits are added to the organization pool, not an individual user's balance.

## Usage optimization tips

To get the most out of your credit allocation:

- **Validate inputs with lookups first.** Database lookups (UniProt, PubChem, NCBI) cost far less than GPU jobs, and they catch a wrong identifier before you pay for a fold or a dock.
- **Test with small inputs first.** Before a batch of 500 docking jobs, run one compound to confirm your parameters. That costs one run instead of 500.
- **Turn thinking off for simple queries.** Extended thinking spends extra tokens without improving answers to straightforward questions.
- **Archive unused projects.** While archiving does not save credits directly, it reduces clutter and helps you focus credit spending on active research.

## Ticket checklist

If you need to contact support about a billing issue, include:

- Organization slug and plan tier
- The exact error text and timestamp
- Job IDs involved (if usage-related)
- Whether you have already attempted to update payment or purchase credits
- Screenshots of the Billing page showing the discrepancy