# Manage billing and credits (/guides/billing) OpenMetal uses prepaid organization credits for managed capacity. Provider usage is deducted from the organization balance. A platform fee applies when credits are purchased. ## Welcome credits [#welcome-credits] Each new user receives a one time USD 500.00 credit grant in the first organization they create. The grant has no purchase fee and cannot be transferred. Additional organizations start with a zero balance. ## Purchase credits [#purchase-credits] The purchase fee is 5.5 percent of the credit amount with a USD 0.80 minimum. ```bash openmetal billing show --organization openmetal billing quote --organization --amount-usd 20.00 openmetal billing checkout --organization --amount-usd 20.00 --open ``` You can also add credits from the [OpenMetal dashboard](https://www.openmetal.sh/dashboard). Credits appear after payment confirmation. ## Automatic top ups [#automatic-top-ups] Owners and admins can save a payment method, then choose a balance threshold, refill amount, and monthly cap. ```bash openmetal billing payment-method --organization --open openmetal billing auto-topup \ --organization \ --enabled true \ --threshold-usd 10.00 \ --refill-usd 50.00 \ --monthly-cap-usd 500.00 ``` A declined payment or required customer action pauses the policy instead of retrying indefinitely. Update the payment method in the dashboard to recover. ## Spend behavior [#spend-behavior] Managed sandbox creation requires a balance above zero. A request without sufficient credits returns `insufficient_credits` with HTTP 402. Usage is applied when provider measurements are available. Delayed measurements can temporarily produce a negative balance. If the balance reaches zero and automatic top up cannot run, OpenMetal schedules managed sandboxes to stop. Some providers report monetary usage directly. Others are calculated from provider runtime measurements and documented rates. The Usage page labels the source and confidence of each amount. ## BYOK [#byok] BYOK capacity is billed by the provider and does not consume OpenMetal credits. A single explicitly selected BYOK provider without fallback can create capacity without a positive managed balance. API amounts use integer micro USD, where USD 1 equals 1,000,000 micro USD. Avoid binary floating point when calculating balances or fees. See the [billing API reference](/api-reference/endpoints/billing/getOrganizationBilling) for request and response schemas.