Pay-per-Use Billing
Pay-per-use billing means you pay nothing up front and are not tied into any contract or commitment. This section describes the billing rules for pay-per-use EIP resources.
Application Scenarios
Pay-per-use billing is good for short-term, bursty, or unpredictable workloads that cannot tolerate any interruptions, such as applications for e-commerce flash sales, temporary testing, and scientific computing.
Billed Items
A pay-per-use EIP can be billed by bandwidth, by traffic, or it can be added to a shared bandwidth. Table 1 lists the billed items in different billing options.
| Billing Option | Billed Item | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Pay-per-use (billed by bandwidth) | Price = EIP reservation price + Bandwidth price |
|
| Pay-per-use (billed by traffic) | Price = EIP reservation price + Traffic price |
|
| Pay-per-use (added to a shared bandwidth) | Price = EIP reservation price + Shared bandwidth price |
|
Billed Usage Period
Pay-per-use EIP usage is calculated by the second and billed every hour. The billing starts when the EIP is assigned and ends when the EIP is released.
For example, if you purchased a pay-per-use EIP at 08:45:30 and released it at 08:55:30, you are billed for the 600 seconds from 08:45:30 to 08:55:30.
Billing Examples
Billing by bandwidth
EIPs use tiered pricing for fixed bandwidth. The price varies by bandwidth size.
The unit price of a fixed bandwidth and whether tiered pricing is used vary by region. For details, see "EIP Pricing Details".
Suppose you purchased an EIP billed by bandwidth of 6 Mbit/s on April 18, 2023, 08:45:00, bound the EIP to an instance on April 18, 2023, 09:45:00, unbound the EIP from the instance on April 19, 2023, 06:45:00, and released the EIP on April 19, 2023, 08:55:00. The EIP reservation price is ¥0.02 CNY per hour. Figure 1 shows how to calculate the hourly bandwidth price in this example. The price for the bandwidth of 6 Mbit/s is ¥0.565 CNY per hour.
Table 2 shows the calculation details. The total price is ¥13.7176 CNY.
| Date | Billing Duration | Price (Bandwidth+ EIP) | Total Price (CNY) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2023/04/18 | 60 minutes 2023/04/18 08:45:00 - 2023/04/18 09:45:00 |
| 0.02 + 0.565 + 0 + 8.0513 = 8.6363 |
| 855 minutes 2023/04/18 09:45:00 - 2023/04/19 00:00:00 |
| ||
| 2023/04/19 | 405 minutes 2023/04/19 00:00:00 - 2023/04/19 06:45:00 |
| 0 + 3.8138 + 0.0433 + 1.2242 = 5.0813 |
| 130 minutes 2023/04/19 06:45:00 - 2023/04/19 08:55:00 |
|
Billing by traffic
Suppose you purchased an EIP billed by traffic on April 18, 2023, 08:45:00 and bound the EIP to an instance on April 18, 2023, 09:45:00. There were 1300 GB traffic generated from 20:00:00 on April 18, 2023 to 06:00:00 on April 19, 2023. Then, you unbound the EIP from the instance on April 19, 2023, 06:45:00 and released the EIP on April 19, 2023, 08:55:00. The EIP reservation price is ¥0.02 CNY per hour, and the traffic price is ¥0.64 CNY per GB.
| Date | Billing Duration | Price (Traffic+ EIP) | Total Price (CNY) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2023/04/18 | 60 minutes with 0 GB traffic generated 2023/04/18 08:45:00 - 2023/04/18 09:45:00 |
| 0.02 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 512 = 512.02 |
| Traffic: 0 GB 2023/04/18 9:45:00 - 2023/04/18 20:00:00 |
| ||
| Traffic: 800 GB 2023/04/18 20:00:00 - 2023/04/19 00:00:00 |
| ||
| 2023/04/19 | Traffic: 500 GB 2023/04/19 00:00:00 - 2023/04/19 06:00:00 |
| 0 + 320 + 0 + 0 + 0.043 + 0 = 320.043 |
| Traffic: 0 GB 2023/04/19 06:00:00 - 2023/04/19 06:45:00 |
| ||
| 130 minutes with 0 GB traffic generated 2023/04/19 06:45:00 - 2023/04/19 08:55:00 |
|
- The prices are just examples. The actual prices are those displayed on "EIP Pricing Details".
- If an EIP billed by traffic uses a dedicated bandwidth, only the bandwidth used in the outbound direction will be billed.
Price Change After Specification Change
If you change specifications within a given hour, multiple records will be generated. Different records record the billing for different specifications.
For example, if you purchased a pay-per-use EIP billed by bandwidth of 6 Mbit/s EIP at 09:00:00 and increased the bandwidth to 20 Mbit/s at 09:30:00, the following items will be billed:
- Bandwidth of 6 Mbit/s from 09:00:00 to 09:30:00
- Bandwidth of 20 Mbit/s from 09:30:00 to 10:00:00
Arrears Impact
Figure 2 shows the statuses a pay-per-use EIP can have throughout its lifecycle. After an EIP is purchased, it enters the valid period and runs normally during this period. If your account goes into arrears, the EIP enters a grace period and then a retention period.
Arrears Reminder
The system will bill you for pay-per-use resources after each billing cycle ends. If your account goes into arrears, we will notify you by email, SMS, or in-app message.
Impact of Arrears
If your account is insufficient to pay your amount due, your account goes into arrears and your resource enters the grace period. Pay-per-use resources are not stopped immediately. You are still responsible for expenditures generated during the grace period. You can view the charges on the Billing Center > Overview page and pay any past due balance as needed.
If you do not bring your account balance current before the grace period expires, the EIP status turns to Frozen and enters a retention period.
If you do not bring your account balance current before the retention period ends, the EIP will be released.
- For details about top-up, see "Topping Up an Account".
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