Tutorial · Task guide
Understand Billing and Usage: Where the Money Goes, Where to Check, How to Cap It
Before you start
- Sign in to see the official-channel balance and ledger; BYOK spending lives in each provider's console.
- Foreverse v76 or later. Builds without credit purchase or the official channel hide those blocks entirely — that is configuration, not a bug.
Where to find it
Me > Reader card > CreditsMe > Reader card > Pricing · how billing worksMe > Credit ledgerMe > Request logMe > JourneyBatch task > Confirm before starting
Step-by-step
Know the two payment channels
Official channel: sign in and use it, metered in credits, 1 credit = US$0.0001 (10,000 credits = US$1), pay-per-use, credits never expire. BYOK: your own API key, billed directly by the provider — Foreverse adds no markup and deducts no credits. Text, image, and speech can each use a different channel.
✓ For any feature you use, you can say which channel pays for it.
Check balance and unit prices
The ★ number on the reader card in Me is your credit balance; tap it for the Credits page and purchase packs. Inside, 'Pricing · how billing works' lists real unit prices for every official model — text as input/output/cache-hit prices per million tokens — issued by the server and synced with official model pricing, so quotes always come from this page, not word of mouth. The footer shows 'cache saved you N', computed from your last 30 days of requests.
✓ You can find the unit price of the model you actually use.
Read the per-item ledgers
Me → Credit ledger (grid under the reader card) lists every row: purchases, chat spending, image generation, speech synthesis, refunds, redeem-code deposits, and welcome-grant deposits. For the technical view of one call — tokens, cache hits, duration — open Me → Request log and expand Technical details on the entry. For the long-run picture (token heatmap, streaks, model ranking), open Me → Journey.
✓ A ledger row, its request-log entry, and the feature you used all tell the same story.
Use the gates before big spends
Any batch task that fires many calls (serial comics, for example) must show 'Confirm before starting': model × call count and who pays, and work begins only after you confirm. Changing the model or the config afterwards requires a fresh confirmation — nothing keeps charging on a stale authorization. Serial comics also carry a monthly generation quota: the app pauses when it is used up, and the quote warns 'N left this month' once less than 20% remains. For Agent sessions, set a per-run token cap (200k/500k/1M) under Run resources so a runaway task stops itself.
✓ You have seen a cost confirmation at least once and know where the Agent token cap lives.
Read task accounting and refunds
When a long task is interrupted, accounting is three-way: finished parts are billed and their content is kept; calls that never reached the upstream are not billed; unknown outcomes are flagged 'may already be charged' and wait for your decision — retry (may pay again) or abandon. Refunds never rewrite history: the original charge row stays as-is and the refund arrives as a new positive ledger row that raises the balance, so both rows reconcile in the Credit ledger.
✓ You can point at a charge row and, if one exists, its matching refund row.
How to know it worked
- The reader card shows the balance and the pricing table shows unit prices for your usual models.
- Every ledger expense maps to one real use, traceable to a request-log entry when needed.
- Batch tasks showed 'Confirm before starting' and you can state the call count and the paying channel.
- BYOK requests appear in the request log tagged BYOK and produce no credit-ledger rows.
Cost, data, and irreversible-risk notes
- Checking balance, pricing, ledgers, the request log, and Journey is free — none of it calls a model.
- Signed out, the Credits page shows a sign-in prompt instead of a balance, and official-channel usage records do not sync. The request log itself stays on your device.
- BYOK spending appears only on the provider's bill; Foreverse cannot refund money charged directly by a third party.
- If media generated but saving failed, the cost is already booked and the content exists — recover or retry delivery instead of regenerating and paying again.
- Pro is a one-time unlock for local quantity limits and includes no AI model usage; credits and Pro are separate things.
Troubleshooting
"Why was I charged credits?"
Likely cause: Every deduction has a source row.
What to do: Find the row in the Credit ledger, open the matching request-log entry for model and usage, then check the pricing page's 'these places auto-charge' list — nearly all auto-spending features default to off.
Credits unchanged but my provider billed me
Likely cause: That call went through BYOK, not the official channel.
What to do: The request log's channel column shows BYOK. The bill lives with your provider; credits are not involved.
No balance shown on the Credits page
Likely cause: You are signed out.
What to do: The page shows a sign-in prompt; balance, ledger, and official usage appear after signing in.
Bought a credit pack but it has not arrived
Likely cause: Store payment receipts can lag.
What to do: Refresh the Credit ledger and look for the purchase row; if it never appears, use Me → Help & feedback with the purchase time attached.
Got a refund but cannot find it
Likely cause: Refunds are appended rows, not edits to the original charge.
What to do: Look for a positive 'refund' row in the Credit ledger; the balance rises with it while the original charge row stays for reconciliation.
Frequently asked questions
How much is one credit worth?
1 credit = US$0.0001, so 10,000 credits = US$1. Credits are metered per use and never expire; what each model costs per call is shown on the pricing page and in the request log.
Can something charge me without my knowing?
Auto-charging entry points are all listed under 'these places auto-charge' on the pricing page, and nearly all default to off (exceptions like continuous audiobook playback are listed honestly). Batch tasks always show a cost confirmation before starting.
How do I keep spending down?
Point background chores at a cheap lightweight-task model, enable per-turn plugins only where you need them, set the Agent per-run token cap, and read batch quotes before confirming. For what failures and interruptions cost, see /docs/guide-models/fix-generation-errors.
Sources and verification
- Models and Usage guide · Foreverse · Verified
- Settings and Data guide · Foreverse · Verified
- Agent and Companion guide · Foreverse · Verified
Coverage and verification
| Platform | Android account and usage |
|---|---|
| App version | v76+ |
| Path verified |