Package Billing

Application Scenarios

The package billing mode requires users to pay for a certain number of API calls in advance and is suitable for long-term, stable business needs. Here are some business scenarios that are suitable for this mode:

• For businesses with long-term and relatively stable resource demands, the package billing mode can provide higher cost-effectiveness.
• For long-term projects, package billing can ensure stable resource usage throughout the entire project cycle.
• If business peak periods can be predicted, purchasing a package in advance can meet the demand during peak periods and avoid resource shortages.
• For businesses with high data security requirements, package billing can ensure continuous resource usage and reduce data security risks caused by resource arrears.

Billed Items

• OCR is charged based on the number of API calls. For billing details, see Price Calculator.
• Only successful API calls are counted and charged, where a 2xx status code indicates a successful call, and failed calls are not counted or charged.

Billed Usage Period

The billing cycle for OCR resources included in a package is determined based on the duration you purchase (UTC+08:00). The start of a billing cycle is the time you enable or renew the resource (accurate to the second), and the end is 23:59:59 on the expiration date.

For example, if you purchase a one-year package for Passport OCR at 14:25:10 on April 19, 2023, the billing cycle will be from 14:25:10 on April 19, 2023 to 23:59:59 April 19, 2024.

Billing Examples

Suppose you purchase a Passport OCR package that contains 100,000 API calls at 15:50:04 on March 8, 2023. The subscription term is one year, and you manually renew it for one year before expiration. Then:

• The first billing cycle runs from March 08, 2023, at 15:50:04 to March 08, 2024, at 23:59:59.
• The second billing cycle runs from March 08, 2024, at 23:59:59 to March 08, 2025, at 23:59:59.

You need to prepay for each billing cycle.

Impact of Expiration

Figure 1 shows the statuses an OCR resource included in a package can go through throughout its lifecycle. After purchasing an OCR service, it will run normally during the billing cycle, which is the validity period. If the service expires and is not renewed, it will gradually enter the grace period and retention period.

Figure 1 Lifecycle of an OCR resource included in a package

Expiration Reminder

For OCR APIs included in a package, the system will send an expiration warning message to the user seven days before the expiration date via email, SMS, or in-app message to the creator of the Huawei Cloud account.

Impact of Expiration

When your OCR API included in a package expires and is not renewed, it will first enter the grace period, and the resource status will change to Expired. During the grace period, you can still access and use cloud services, but the following operations will be restricted:

• APIs that do not allow package reset, such as "100,000-API-call Web Image OCR package", cannot be purchased or renewed if there is a remaining balance after the package is in arrears.
• Services cannot be subscribed to.

To avoid affecting normal service use, please top up your account promptly on the Huawei Cloud console's Billing Center after receiving the arrears notice.

If you still do not renew your OCR API during the grace period, it will enter a retention period and the resource status will become Frozen. You will not be able to perform any operations on the API in the retention period.

After the retention period expires and the OCR API is still not renewed, the data stored in the API will be deleted, the API will be released, and pay-per-use resources will be deleted. The data cannot be recovered.

• Huawei Cloud defines different grace periods and retention periods for different tiers of customers. You can check your tier by logging in to the management console and choosing Basic Information under your username in the upper right corner.

• For details about renewals, see Overview.