Our pay-as-you-go (PAYG) feature lets you send messages using our rate card and applies to multiple messaging channels, including SMS and WhatsApp. You’re only charged on your regular invoice for what you send each month. To help you manage your spending, we also offer tools like spend limits and email alerts.
Set up pay-as-you-go
If you’ve never used messaging before, you must purchase a number and activate the PAYG rate card for your desired channel.
Learn more in Purchase an SMS number.
If you’re already using SMS with credits, you must contact us to swap from credits to pay-as-you-go.
PAYG is not channel-specific. It works for SMS, WhatsApp, and other supported messaging channels.
Use the rate card
We list our pay-as-you-go prices on channel-specific rate cards.
To view your rate card:
For SMS:
Go to Settings > SMS > SMS settings, then select the Rate card tab.
For WhatsApp:
Go to Settings > WhatsApp > Rate card.
Rate card prices may change monthly. Check them regularly to stay informed about the cost of sending messages to your chosen countries.
Spend limit and alerts
When you set up pay-as-you-go in-app, we give you an automatic spend limit per month.
The monthly spend limit is set to be high enough that you shouldn’t ever hit it. This prevents issues with a spend limit set too low and being inadvertently reached, causing SMS sends to stop unexpectedly.
To help you to control your SMS spend, you should set an email alert to be sent when your spend reaches the specified amount.
To do this:
Expand the User menu and go to Settings > General > Account settings.
Select the Enable SMS pay-as-you-go alerts checkbox.
Enter an alert amount in the box.
Select SAVE SETTINGS.
These notifications are sent to the account owner and users with the Can manage account permission enabled.
Know what you’ve spent
Once you start sending SMS using pay-as-you-go, you can see what countries you’ve sent to, and at what price.
To see this, expand the User menu and go to Settings > General > Usage.