Advanced Usage Billing: Prepaid with Drawdown
Picture yourself at your favourite coffee shop, Bean & Brew. You come by every morning for your usual cappuccino, and occasionally you get an extra cold brew and a muffin or two in the afternoon. Interestingly, Bean & Brew has a new idea of offering a Coffee Pass. You can pay $50 in advance for 25 drinks. Each time you purchase a coffee, the system automatically deducts one drink from your prepaid balance. The goal is to have no wait time at the counter.
Some weeks, you go there every day. You might skip a few mornings at other times. No matter what, you've already paid in full, and you're just taking money out of your balance/credit as you go.
You can immediately add money to your balance if it gets low or runs out. If you have extra drinks at the end of the month, you can even roll them over to the next month. The payment process seems straightforward and clear while giving you full control.
That's the simplest way to explain Prepaid with Drawdown.
The New Reality
Prepaid with Drawdown is quietly gaining ground because people need it in today's world. Businesses that offer AI, machine learning, and cloud services have a unique problem as they slowly move into consumption-based billing. They can't predict how their services will be used. A customer might make a few API requests one week, and the next week, they might process millions of data points or hours of video.
Traditional monthly billing is difficult to maintain. Customers often receive bills they weren't expecting, and businesses have to wait longer for money and take on more credit risk.
That's when Prepaid with Drawdown comes into play.
Customers pay in advance for a set number of credits or usage units. The system automatically takes credits from the prepaid balance every time they use the service, whether it's transcription minutes or an API call. Customers can always see what's left, add more when they need to, and, depending on the provider's policy, roll over unused credits.
It's a model that combines predictability and flexibility. It lets customers control costs while businesses keep a steady flow of cash.
Prepaid with Drawdown in Zoho Billing
Zoho Billing has built-in support for Prepaid with Drawdown billing, which makes it easy for businesses to switch to this new model quickly and easily. This prepaid drawdown will change the game for setting up fair and real-time cash flow if you work in AI services, SaaS, cloud computing, or any other business model that relies on consumption.
Create prepaid plan or add-on: Define prepaid products so that customers pay for usage credits in advance.
Drawdown Addon: Link usage lets services automatically take credits out of prepaid balances.
Real-time usage tracking: Track usage through Zoho's API or admin console and see the balance change right away.
Manage Overage and Rollover: Set up how overage usage is billed and how unused credit can be rolled over.
Top-Up and Overrides: Let customers add credits in the middle of a billing cycle or change the number of credits when they sign up for a subscription.
Statement and Invoicing: Statement shows the number of credits/units consumed, and it can be invoiced instantly or with the upcoming cycle along with overage charges.
Scenario:
Let's say a cloud storage service offers a safe place for startups and content creators to store and back up their data.
The service provider offers a Prepaid Storage Plan because file uploads and downloads can vary a lot from month to month. Every customer pays in advance for a certain amount of data credits, like 5TB. Zoho Billing keeps track of how much they use every time they upload or download files and takes the same amount out of their prepaid balance.
The service provider also offers a Compression Service, where each GB of compressed data users receive 0.5 GB worth of credit.
Anna subscribes to the prepaid storage plan.
She consumes 800 GB of data on the first day.
Zoho Billing takes 800 GB off their prepaid balance right away, leaving them with 4200 GB.
Anna consumes 100 GB of compressed data, which Zoho Billing seamlessly handles through a drawdown rate and reduces the credit by 50 GB.
Again, on day 10, another 1000 GB was used, leaving Anna with a balance of 3150 GB in credit at the end of the month.
When usage tracking is connected to Zoho Billing in real time using APIs, all of this happens in real time.
Suppose, the balance credit reaches zero, Zoho Billing automatically starts tracking any extra usage as overage. This extra usage will be charged at standard rates on the next invoice or right away if the business chooses to "Charge Now." Also, The service provider rolls over the credits to the next billing cycle to make it flexible and fair.
Note: The prepaid with Drawdown billing model is currently in early access. Reach out to support@zohobilling.com to enable it for your business. Then, go through our Prepaid with Drawdown in Zoho Billing help document to configure it in your organization. For Customers | For Business |
Pay in advance to avoid surprise bills or missing payments. | Getting paid before services are used will improve cash flow. |
Keep an eye on the credits you use and your remaining balance right away. | Keep unpaid bills and late payments to a minimum. |
Buy more units whenever you need them to handle a spike in use. | Track how people use your service in real time to optimize service delivery. |
Unused credits can be carried over when policies allow them, so there is no waste. | Overage can be tracked and monetized easily without service interruption. |
I am confident that the next time you use your coffee pass at Bean & Brew, or any other prepaid service, you will realize it is more than just a convenience. It's a small, everyday reflection of how many big data-driven companies are changing how we pay for technology.
Topic Participants
Hari Hara Sudhan. S
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