Usage-based charges for texts, calls and email

Messages, texts and call minutes are metered by what they actually cost, itemised on a monthly invoice, and shown to you before you are billed.

What it is

Every send writes a usage row with a billable quantity and the rate that applied at that moment. A monthly sweep groups unbilled rows by rate-card key, prices them, and creates one itemised invoice — email, texts sent, texts received, call minutes, voicemail transcription — plus a single card-processing fee line.

Also called: what am I paying for · text message costs · usage bill · communication charges · metered billing

See it
Usage-based charges for texts, calls and email
Prepared for
Delia Yoder
1140 Ridge Line Rd · Fair Play
Shell package$26,040
Concrete & site$7,560
Doors & windows$5,040
Trim & finish$3,360
Total
$42,000
Signature
The itemised usage invoice: 'Email — 1,240 sent', 'Text messages — 318 segments sent', 'Calls — 46 minutes', 'Card processing fee'. src/lib/usageBilling.ts. Sample data — no customer information appears here.
How it works
  1. 1Only successful sends are counted; a failed or gated send cost nothing and never appears on a bill.
  2. 2Rows are grouped by rate-card key and summed by units — segments and minutes, never row counts.
  3. 3An unpriced usage kind is left unbilled rather than marked billed at zero, so it is picked up once a rate exists.
  4. 4Rows are marked billed only after the processor accepted the line item, so a crash mid-sweep re-bills nothing and loses nothing.
  5. 5A dry-run mode computes and returns the exact lines without touching anything.
Why we built it

Texts, calls and emails are billed to us by the carriers continuously, whatever else happens, and the only way that cost comes back is a monthly sweep that bills it on. If the sweep does not run, or runs and quietly bills nothing, the carrier has already been paid and nobody ever asks for the money back. It runs on a schedule, prices each business's usage at that business's own rates and posts it to their subscription — and it can be run as a dry run first, because the alternative to checking is discovering a pricing mistake on a customer's card.

The problem
  • Opaque communication charges with no breakdown.
  • Being billed for failed sends.
  • A billing run crashing and either double-charging or losing revenue.
Sound familiar?
What you get
The invoice says exactly what was used, in plain units.
Zero-usage months are not invoiced at all, rather than sent a $0 invoice.
Re-running the sweep is always safe.
What's inside
Billed by segments and minutes, not by rows
A long text is several segments, an inbound text costs money too, and a call is minutes — all recorded at send time with the price that applied.
You're not charged for messages we don't pay for
Messages carried by a provider the business already pays for are excluded from metering entirely — the meter only starts when the cost lands on us.
Rate card and margin engine
One rate card sets the price of every unit, with per-business and per-tier overrides — and the business only ever sees the final price.
See your usage before the bill
A month-by-month usage view priced at your own rates, current month first, six months back.
Carrier compliance fees billed automatically
The one-off carrier brand fee and the monthly campaign fee are invoiced at your rate-card price, and the monthly fee only starts when texting actually turns on.

See it on your own jobs

Twenty minutes, your numbers, no slide deck. We’ll build one of your real buildings in front of you and send you the estimate link at the end — yours to keep either way.

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