How is my account charged with UtilityAPI?

On-demand collections

For on-demand collections, including initial historical collections and refreshes, we process charges in two steps based on the data duration you have selected for one or multiple meters. 

Step 1 - Temporary Charge. Once you start an on-demand collection, we calculate and apply a temporary charge to the card on your account or your account balance, based on the number of months of data requested and the pricing table below.

Temporary Charge Examples:  

• 1 month requested: (1 meter x 1 month of data) = $1.50 temporary charge 
• 12 months requested: (1 meter x 12 months of data) = $12.00 temporary charge
• 36 months requsted: (1 meter x 36 months of data) = $48.00 temporary charge 

Step 2 - Final Charge. 

As soon as an on-demand collection meets our definition of success, a final charge will be assessed to your account's card or account balance. If our first attempt at collecting data doesn't meet our definition of success, we will try again multiple times over a 7-day period.

• After 7 days, if we cannot collect any data, we will reduce the final charge to $0.00. 
• After 7 days, if we cannot successfully collect the total duration of data requested, we will adjust the final charge to the number of months we did successfully collect.

Final Charge Examples:

• 1 month requested and 0 month successfully collected: (1 meter x 0 month of data) = $0.00 final charge 
• 12 months requested and 12 months successfully collected: (1 meter x 12 months of data) = $12.00 final charge
• 36 months requested and 7 months successfully collected: (1 meter x 7 months of data) = $10.50 final charge 

What is considered a successful on-demand collection? 

On-demand collection success is defined as collecting all of the bill data or 90% of the Interval data attributes from each meter for the collection data duration identified below.

Bill data:

• Service tariff
• Bill start date
• Bill end date 
• Total bill period volume (kWh/therms)
• Total unit (kWh/therms)
• Total bill period cost 

Interval data:

• Interval start date and time
• Interval end date and time
• Interval value total

If you request 12 months of data, a successful collection will mean you either receive: 

• 12 months worth of bill data, or 
• 90% of intervals over a 12-month period.

Scheduled collections

When you enroll a meter in our Ongoing Monitoring service regardless, of your pricing plan and structure, your account will be charged a fee each month based on the monitoring frequency selected (i.e., daily, weekly, monthly) and your account's payment plan. 

Meters enrolled in Ongoing Monitoring will incur a monthly subscription fee as long as they meet the following criteria:

• The Ongoing Monitoring subscription remains active; 
• The authorization associated with the meter is not revoked or expired; 
• The utility has not stopped or modified the meter's information; 
• UtilityAPI has been able to collect data at least once in the last 6 months.

Note: Archiving a meter does not stop scheduled collections or unenroll a meter from Ongoing Monitoring  

What makes my scheduled collection completed via Ongoing Monitoring successful?

Ongoing Monitoring is considered successful when we monitor your enrolled meter for the availability of new data based on that meter's subscription frequency. We may monitor a meter enrolled in Ongoing Monitoring and find no new data available. We still consider this a successful monitoring.

If new data is available, Ongoing Monitoring does not guarantee the successful collection of all available data. If new data becomes available at the next scheduled monitoring date, we will attempt to collect the data, but we do not guarantee a successful collection. 

How can I view my account's charges?

To view your account's charges, go to the Payment Settings section of your settings and click on the link next to Usage History called "Click here to see your usage and payment history."

After clicking on this link, you'll see a History of charges to your account by date.