# Billing

> Manage payments, publisher seats, invoices, plan changes, and cancellation.
> URL: https://artor.app/docs/billing

Manage your organization's subscription under **Settings → Billing**. Only owners and admins
can make billing changes. Artor charges for [publisher seats](https://artor.app/docs/seats); reviewers are free.
See [Plans & pricing](https://artor.app/docs/plans) for prices and included limits.

## What you are charged

Your bill is the plan's per-seat price multiplied by the number of publishers, with a minimum
of one billed seat. The seat count updates when invitations are accepted, seats change, or
members leave. Updates usually appear shortly afterward; any difference is corrected within
a day.

Seat changes are **prorated**: you pay only for the part of the billing period a seat was used.
Adding a publisher increases the next invoice; removing one reduces it. These adjustments
settle on your next invoice, including at annual renewal for yearly plans. Yearly adjustments
use the annual seat price, not the monthly equivalent shown in the pricing table.

Changing a reviewer to a publisher asks you to confirm the price first. Invitations also
show the price once billing details are available.

Prices exclude tax. Artor currently adds no tax, so the quoted amount is the amount charged.

## Upgrading

For an existing organization:

1. Open **Settings → Billing**.
2. Choose Pro or Team and a monthly or yearly interval.
3. Complete Stripe Checkout.

Your plan changes after payment clears, usually within a few seconds. The payer receives a
confirmation email with the plan, interval, amount charged, seat count, and renewal date.

### Paying for a new organization

Start from **New organization** and choose a paid plan. After checkout returns you to Billing,
open **New organization** again to finish creating it. The new organization uses your purchase;
it is not created before payment clears. Only one unused purchase can be waiting at a time.

**Warning:** 
  Your subscription starts when you pay, even if you haven't created the organization yet.
  Finish creating it promptly to use the time you paid for.

If you leave the purchase unused, Artor sends a warning after **5 days**. After **7 days**, it
cancels the subscription and refunds the charge to the original payment method. Creating the
organization before the refund keeps the purchase. If an automatic refund cannot be completed,
contact [contact@artor.app](mailto:contact@artor.app).

### Changing between Pro and Team

You can upgrade from Pro to Team in Billing, or switch either direction in the payment portal.
Unused paid time is credited and the price difference is prorated. Check the amount shown
before confirming. A plan change in the portal starts a new billing period on that date.

## Managing your subscription

Choose **Manage billing** to open the Stripe payment portal. There you can update your card,
download invoices, change plans, or cancel. Changes sync back to Artor automatically.

Plan and billing-interval changes are confirmed by email. Updating a card does not send an
Artor plan-change email.

For a yearly-to-monthly switch, use Artor's **Switch to monthly** button if you want to keep
the rest of your paid year. The portal handles that switch differently, as shown below.

## Switching between monthly and yearly

| Change | Where to do it | When it takes effect | What happens to your payment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Monthly → yearly | Payment portal | Immediately; a new yearly period starts that day | Unused monthly time becomes credit toward the yearly charge. Review the exact amount before confirming. |
| Yearly → monthly, keeping the paid year | **Switch to monthly** in Artor Billing | At the end of your current yearly period | No charge or refund when you schedule it. Your first monthly invoice arrives when the paid year ends. |
| Yearly → monthly immediately | Payment portal | Immediately | Unused yearly time becomes account credit. |

A scheduled switch shows its date in Billing. **Go back to yearly** cancels it before that
date without charging or refunding anything. You receive an email when a switch is scheduled
and another when it takes effect.

**Note:** 
  If cancellation is pending, resume the subscription before scheduling a switch. While a
  switch is scheduled, cancel it with **Go back to yearly** before making another plan change
  in the portal. If Artor cannot schedule the switch for your subscription, contact
  [contact@artor.app](mailto:contact@artor.app).

## Where the money left over goes

Seat reductions and unused paid time reduce an invoice or become **account credit**. Credit
is applied automatically before your card is charged and carries forward if it exceeds the
next bill.

Account credit is not an automatic refund to your card. For a card refund, contact
[contact@artor.app](mailto:contact@artor.app). The unused new-organization purchase described
above has its own automatic refund process.

## Cancelling

Cancel in the payment portal. You keep your paid plan until the end of the current billing
period, and you can resume before that date. An email confirms when renewal will stop.

When the subscription ends, your organization moves to Free and another email confirms it.
**Cancellation does not delete your prototypes or data.** Free limits apply, including the
[90-day inactivity policy](https://artor.app/docs/plans#inactive-free-organizations). Export what you need if
nobody will keep using the organization.

Existing publishers keep their seats. The Free seat limit prevents adding more publishers;
it does not remove existing ones. Other Free limits can still restrict publishing — see
[Usage](https://artor.app/docs/usage#what-each-limit-actually-does). If you upgrade again, every current publisher
is billed from the first invoice, so review the publisher list beforehand.

The portal asks for an optional cancellation reason and comment. If provided, these are sent
to the Artor team.

## If a payment fails

Stripe retries the card and emails the payer. Your Artor access stays the same during the
retry window. If all retries fail, the subscription ends and the organization moves to Free.
The payer receives an email explaining how to update the card and resubscribe. The downgrade
itself does not delete data; Free limits and inactivity rules then apply.

## Receipts and records

- **History** in Billing shows the 24 most recent invoices with receipt links. The payment
  portal holds your complete invoice history.
- Billing emails are always sent, regardless of [notification preferences](https://artor.app/docs/notifications).
- Plan changes, seat changes, and scheduled switches appear in the [audit log](https://artor.app/docs/audit-log).

## Related

- [Plans & pricing](https://artor.app/docs/plans) — prices and included limits
- [Seats](https://artor.app/docs/seats) — publishers and reviewers
- [Usage](https://artor.app/docs/usage) — what happens when you reach a limit