Fair Usage Policy

1.Why we have this Policy

Our unlimited and bundled allowances are priced on the basis of how a typical business team uses a phone system: people making and taking live calls during their working day. We pay carriers for every minute and message that passes through our network. This Policy keeps our pricing low and our service reliable for every customer by making sure that a small number of accounts cannot use a per-seat plan for high-volume, automated or wholesale traffic that it was never priced to cover.

Most customers will never be affected by this Policy. If your usage approaches a limit, we will tell you before we take any action, except in cases of fraud or abuse described in section 8.

2.What "unlimited" means

2.1 Normal business use. "Unlimited" means that we do not charge per minute or per message for the covered call types in section 3, within the thresholds in this Policy. It is for normal business use by one named User per seat: live, two-way conversations between a person on your team and another person, placed or answered manually or with click-to-call, whether from an office or by a User working from home.

2.2 One seat, one person. Each seat and its allowance belong to one named User. Sharing a login, or routing several people's calls through one seat, is not normal business use.

2.3 Covered destinations only. Unlimited calling applies only to the destinations listed for your Plan (for example, standard landline and mobile numbers in the United States and Canada). All other destinations are charged at the Usage Fees shown in the platform. Some high-cost destinations within those countries are excluded from unlimited calling, including the Yukon, Northwest Territories and Nunavut, US territories such as Puerto Rico, Guam and the US Virgin Islands, certain high-cost rural exchanges, and conference, chat-line and premium-rate numbers. The destinations can be checked in the platform and in the Dashboard. All excluded and other destinations are charged at the Usage Fees shown in the platform.

2.4 Business hours, not 24 hours. Unlimited does not mean round-the-clock calling from one seat. Each seat's allowance covers one person's working day. For each User, the working day starts when that User first logs in on a calendar day and lasts 9 hours (the "Business Hours Window"), measured in the time zone of your business location as set in the Dashboard. For example, if your team works from India and an agent first logs in at 9:30 am IST, that agent's Business Hours Window runs until 6:30 pm IST.

2.5 Reasonable flexibility. We allow for ordinary overtime. A seat may be active for up to 10 hours in any 24-hour period, and occasional activity outside the Business Hours Window (for example, returning a missed call in the evening) is fair use.

2.6 Use beyond one working day is shared usage. A seat that is regularly active beyond one Business Hours Window in a day, for example across two or three shifts, or close to 24 hours a day, is being used by more than one person. That is shared usage of a licence, which is not permitted under section 2.2 and clause 3.2 of the Terms. We treat a seat as regularly active beyond its window if it exceeds 10 hours of activity in a 24-hour period on more than 3 days in a calendar month.

2.7 Shift teams and 24-hour desks. If you run shifts or a 24-hour support desk, you need one seat for each person on each shift. For example, three agents covering three 8-hour shifts need three seats, not one. Contact us at sales@hyperdial.io if you need help sizing a shift-based team.

2.8 Consequences. If we identify shared usage, we will follow the steps in section 8, and may require you to buy additional seats to cover the actual number of Users. If shared usage continues after notice, or is repeated, we may suspend or stop the affected seats or Services under clause 18 of the Terms and terminate for breach under clause 19.2.

3.Allowances by Plan

Current allowances for each Plan are shown on our pricing page.

4.How usage is measured

4.1 Pooled across your account. Per-User allowances are pooled at account level. Your monthly account allowance is the per-User allowance multiplied by the number of paid, active seats during that month. For example, a Growth account with 10 seats has a pooled allowance of 30,000 outbound minutes (if 1 user gets 10,000 minutes) to the US and Canada. One heavy User does not trigger this Policy while the account as a whole stays within its pooled allowance.

4.2 Monthly cycle. Allowances reset at the start of each billing month. Unused minutes and messages do not carry over, cannot be transferred between accounts and have no cash value.

4.3 Rating. Minutes are counted in the way set out in clause 12.2 of the Terms (per minute, rounded up to the next full minute). SMS and MMS are counted per segment, as defined by the carrier.

4.4 Your usage meter. You can see your pooled usage at any time in the Dashboard. We will email your account administrator when the account reaches 80% and 100% of any monthly allowance.

5.What unlimited allowances do not cover

The following are always charged at the Usage Fees shown in the platform, or require a separate plan or add-on, even on Plans with unlimited allowances:

1. (a)calls placed by a predictive dialer, or by any dialer that starts more than one call per available User;
2. (b)minutes handled by AI voice agents, including time an AI agent spends on a call before it transfers to a person;
3. (c)bulk, broadcast or campaign SMS, and messages sent by workflows, automations, bots or the API;
4. (d)international calls and messages, and calls to premium-rate, shared-cost, satellite or special service numbers;
5. (e)the outbound leg of calls forwarded to an external number (for example, to a personal mobile);
6. (f)conference bridges, fax, and calls to or from other VoIP platforms used to relay traffic; and
7. (g)any use on a Plan that does not include unlimited allowances, such as the Free Plan beyond its stated limits.

6.Usage that is not fair use

Beyond the thresholds in section 3, we look at patterns of use. The following are not normal business use and may lead to action under section 8, even if your account is within its minute or message allowance:

1. (a)Seat sharing: more than one person using a single seat, or one User login active in more than 2 places at once;
2. (b)Trunking and PBX routing: connecting a Number or seat to a PBX, SIP trunk, key system or another phone system capable of handling several simultaneous calls, unless your Plan expressly includes SIP trunking;
3. (c)Excessive concurrency: more simultaneous calls than one per active seat, or concurrent calls regularly exceeding 30% of your seats on a Plan not designed for call-centre use;
4. (d)Automated or list dialing on a manual plan: patterns typical of autodialing, such as a high share of very short calls (more than 40% of outbound calls lasting under 10 seconds) or a low answer rate (under 15% of outbound calls connected) sustained over a month;
5. (e)Use beyond business hours: a single seat active across more than one Business Hours Window in a day, or close to 24 hours a day, as described in sections 2.4 to 2.8;
6. (f)Reselling or wholesale use: providing calls, Numbers or messaging to third parties, running a calling or messaging service for others, or using HyperDial as an interconnection or termination route;
7. (g)Traffic generation: access stimulation, traffic pumping, International Revenue Share Fraud, Wangiri, SIM-box use, or any traffic designed to generate revenue from calls rather than to communicate; and
8. (h)Number rotation: acquiring or cycling Numbers to spread traffic so as to avoid spam labels, carrier blocking or the thresholds in this Policy.

7.Messaging limits

7.1 Daily and carrier limits. In addition to the monthly allowance, one-to-one messaging is limited to 500 SMS/MMS segments per day per registered brand, unless your carrier registration permits a higher volume. Carriers also set throughput limits for 10DLC campaigns and verified toll-free Numbers, and those limits apply regardless of your Plan.

7.2 Registration first. Messages sent before the required 10DLC, toll-free verification or DLT registration is approved do not count as fair use and may be blocked by carriers.

8.What happens if usage exceeds this Policy

8.1 Step 1: we tell you. If your account exceeds a threshold in section 3, or shows shared usage under section 2.6 or a pattern described in section 6, we will notify your account administrator by email and in the Dashboard, explaining what we have seen.

8.2 Step 2: time to adjust. You will have 14 days from the notice to bring usage back within this Policy, or to move to a Plan or add-on that suits your usage, such as a dialer or call-centre bundle. We are happy to help you choose one.

8.3 Step 3: charges or limits. If usage stays above the Policy after that period, we may do one or more of the following, from the end of the notice period:

1. (a)charge the excess minutes or messages at the standard Usage Fees shown in the platform;
2. (b)move the affected seats or the account to a Plan suited to the usage, with at least 7 days' notice of the new Fees;
3. (c)apply reasonable limits, such as caps on concurrent calls or daily volumes; or
4. (d)suspend the affected feature or seats under clause 18 of the Terms.

8.4 Immediate action. We may act immediately, without following steps 1 to 3, where we reasonably suspect fraud, toll fraud, traffic generation, account compromise, or use that breaches clause 5 or 10 of the Terms, where a carrier or regulator requires it, or where unusually high usage threatens the stability or performance of our network, API or systems. In that last case we may temporarily limit or suspend calling until the risk has passed. We will tell you what we have done and why as soon as practicable.

8.5 No retrospective charges. We will not charge you for excess usage that occurred before the date of our notice under section 8.1, except in the cases described in section 8.4.

9.Protecting your account

9.1 Spending controls. International calling and calls to high-cost destinations are disabled by default. Your administrator can enable them by country, and can set spending limits and alerts for metered usage in the Dashboard.

9.2 Responsibility for usage. Usage from your account, including usage caused by compromised credentials, is your responsibility as set out in clause 3.3 of the Terms. Keep credentials secure and tell us immediately at sales@hyperdial.io if you suspect unauthorised use.

10.Changes to this Policy

We may update this Policy from time to time, for example when carrier costs or rules change. We will give at least 1 day notice of material changes by email to your account administrator and in the Dashboard, in the same way as changes to the Terms under clause 25. We will not reduce the allowances of an annual subscription during its current term, unless a carrier or regulator requires it.

11.Questions

If you are unsure whether your planned use fits your Plan, contact us before you start at sales@hyperdial.io with the subject line "Fair Usage". We will confirm in writing, and recommend a Plan or bundle if needed.