Upgrade and downgrade

Upgrades are immediate and prorated. Downgrades and cancellations take effect at the end of your billing cycle.

The 30-second version

Switch plans from Settings → Billing. Upgrades update the Stripe subscription in place with prorated billing — you pay the difference for the remainder of the current cycle, and your new allowance is available immediately. Downgrades are scheduled for the end of the current cycle so you don't lose paid-for time.

Why this matters

Plans are picked under uncertainty. You don't always know in week one of a quarter whether you'll need Pro or Growth, and the cost of being wrong should be small. AtelyaOS uses Stripe's standard proration model, so upgrades cost what you'd expect (the difference) and downgrades don't waste prepaid time.

How it works

Upgrading

Go to Settings → Billing. Pick the new plan. Stripe creates a prorated invoice for the difference between your current plan and the new one for the remainder of the cycle, charges your card on file, and the new allowance becomes available immediately.

What happens technically:

• AtelyaOS calls Stripe's subscription update with proration_behavior: "create_prorations".
• Stripe issues a prorated invoice (line item: difference for remaining days).
• The webhook updates your workspace plan flag.
• Your new credit allowance is granted at the start of your next monthly cycle. The current cycle's allowance is whatever you had under the old plan.

Practical effect: pay-now, get-new-features-now, get-new-credits-next-cycle. If you need extra credits this cycle to cover a spike, buy a credit pack instead.

Downgrading

Pick a lower-priced plan from Settings → Billing. Stripe schedules the change for the end of the current cycle. You keep your current plan's seats, agent caps, and allowance until the cycle ends, then switch.

Why end-of-cycle: if you've already paid for Pro this month, downgrading to Solo on day 14 should not refund you and leave you stuck with Solo's seat caps for the next 16 days.

Switching frequency

You can change plans as often as you like. There's no hard cap on switches per cycle. The only rule is that downgrades wait until cycle end while upgrades apply immediately.

Cancelling instead of downgrading

Cancellation behaves like the most aggressive downgrade — you return to the Free Trial plan at the end of the cycle. See cancellation.

If you want to stop billing immediately rather than at cycle end, you can also cancel immediately — Stripe issues no refund for the prepaid period, but you're no longer billed for the next one.

Where to watch the change land

• Settings → Billing — shows the current plan and any pending change.
• Activity log — records the plan change event with timestamp.
• Credit balance — visible immediately after upgrade if Stripe's webhook arrives in time. Refresh the page if it lags.

[SCREENSHOT: billing settings showing pending plan change]

What you keep, what you lose

When upgrading: you gain seats, agents, allowance, and any tier-gated features that are above your old plan.

When downgrading: you keep all your data — workrooms, agents, samples, exports — but tier-gated features become unavailable. If you have more custom agents than the new tier permits, existing agents continue working but you can't create new ones until you delete down to the cap.

Common pitfalls

• Upgrading to fix a credit shortfall today. Upgrades give the new allowance starting next cycle, not now. For "I need credits this week" use a top-up pack.
• Downgrading mid-month and assuming features change immediately. They don't — downgrades wait for cycle end.
• Forgetting about agent caps when downgrading. If you're at 5 agents on Pro and downgrade to Starter (cap 3), the existing 5 keep working but you can't add new ones until you delete down to 3.
• Ignoring webhook timing. Plan changes propagate via Stripe webhooks. There can be a few seconds of lag between paying and seeing the new plan badge.

What's next

• Credit packs — for one-off shortfalls.
• Cancellation — full opt-out.
• Pricing plans — the seven tiers.