How billing works & managing your card

Everything about paying for leancosts: how you’re priced, how to add or update a card, and what happens if a payment doesn’t go through.

How you’re priced

leancosts is one plan, billed on the cloud spend it monitors, never on the savings it finds. Spend falls into a band, and the band has one flat price. A spike inside a band changes nothing; only crossing into the next band changes what you pay, and then it’s that band’s flat price.

Your price for a month is set by the band your previous month’s monitored spend fell into, so you know it on the 1st and it does not move while the month runs. If September was a busier month, that shows up in October’s price, never as a mid-month surprise. Your first month has no previous month to price it, so it starts free.

Admin → Workspace → Subscription shows the band, its flat price and the month it was priced on, plus this month’s monitored spend so far.

The largest tier (Enterprise) is sales-led: we’ll set that up with you directly. The smallest tier is free while your monitored cloud spend stays under the Micro band edge (< $2.5k / < R$10k per month), no card required. When you grow past the edge, you move to the Starter band. Trials above the edge get a 7-day full-access window on their first completed sync (once per cloud account) before the subscribe decision.

If you’ve agreed a monthly price with us, the Subscription page shows that price and the months it covers instead of a band price, with the list price beside it for reference.

Price changes

If we change our prices, we announce it at least 30 days before the new price takes effect, and a price change always starts on the 1st of a month, the month we name, never the one you are in.

You see it in two places: an upcoming-price line on Admin → Workspace → Subscription (“From 1 Nov 2026 your band costs R$ 2,190/mo”), and one email to your workspace’s billing admins. If you pay by card, the new amount reaches your card on your first billing cycle after that date.

A price change can also move the band edges, which can put the same monthly spend in a different band. When that happens the announcement names the new band and its spend range, so the 30 days and the email cover it exactly as a change to the price of your existing band would.

If you’ve agreed a monthly price with us, a change to the price list does not affect it: your contract is the price for the months it covers.

Currencies

Today leancosts prices in US dollars or Brazilian reais, and your workspace is set to one of them when it’s created. Whichever one you’re priced in, Paddle charges your card in your own local currency: it converts at checkout from your billing address, so you don’t need a price list in your currency to pay in it.

We add native price lists as we open new markets; if you’d like one for yours, tell us at sales@leancosts.com.

Adding a card

Find it in Admin → Workspace → Subscription.

1. Once a closed month puts you in a paid band, the plan card shows Add a card to activate.
2. That takes you to Paddle’s secure hosted checkout: our payment provider (and merchant of record). Enter your card there.
3. We never see or store your card number. leancosts only keeps a reference to your account at Paddle and your subscription status.

After checkout, your subscription shows as active and your card is billed automatically each month for your band’s price.

Note

On the free tier there’s nothing you have to activate: the Subscription page shows your free plan, its limits, and the band edge, and the add-a-card step appears by itself when your monitored spend grows past the edge into a paid band: from the month after the one that crossed it.

Paying by invoice

Not everyone pays by card. Paying by invoice is available on request: ask us at sales@leancosts.com. If we set it up for your workspace, we issue the invoice and you pay it by bank transfer, and your Subscription page shows Subscribe instead of Add a card. Everything else is the same: the same band, the same flat price, the same invoice history on the same page.

If we agreed a courtesy period with you, the Subscription page shows its end date and nothing is charged until then.

Updating your card or canceling

When your subscription is active, the Subscription page links to Manage billing: Paddle’s secure portal, where you can update your card or payment details. To cancel, use Cancel subscription on the same page; your workspace and history are kept if you come back.

What happens if a payment fails

Nothing scary, and nothing sudden.

• We’ll show a calm heads-up on the Subscription page: your last payment didn’t go through.
• Your access is unaffected while we sort it out: the product doesn’t lock.
• The card is automatically retried over the next few days.
• If your card changed, use the update-card link in that notice (Paddle’s portal) and the next retry will pick it up.

If everything stays unresolved after the retries, we’ll reach out: there’s never a silent lockout.

A note on Brazil (BRL)

If your workspace is billed in BRL, you pay through Paddle like everyone else: there is no separate Brazilian rail. Paddle prices in reais natively, so a Brazilian address is charged the real amount shown on the pricing page, not a converted dollar figure. You’ll see Adicionar cartão para ativar once you reach a paid band, and you can pay by credit card, PayPal, Google Pay or Apple Pay. Your receipt and invoice come from Paddle, which is the merchant of record.

Two things to know:

• No Pix and no boleto, and no Brazilian nota fiscal on the self-serve plan. If your finance team requires a nota fiscal, boleto or Pix, talk to us about contract billing instead: write to sales@leancosts.com.
• Enter your billing address as BR at checkout so Paddle quotes the real amount. A non-Brazilian address is quoted in dollars, and we don’t re-price after the fact.

While the card rail is being switched on you may still settle invoices directly with the leancosts team; either way your plan, estimate, and invoice history stay in the same place.