What are ad-hoc charges?
There are various costs and fees that apply to your actual everyday use of Aloware. These charges only apply when you actually use the product (for example send a bulk message or take calls on a toll-free number) and are not a subscription that renew. These charges will "deduct" your Aloware credits, until your credits hit 0.
Let's take a closer look at these ad-hoc charges:
Carrier fees
Sending any text or MMS in US and Canada comes with industry-mandated carrier fees. These fees range from $0.005 to $0.015 per segment of SMS/MMS. They are passed directly from the carriers to you and are not marked up by Aloware.
Carrier fees are separate from the cost-per-SMS charges and are paid for separately. For a complete list of carrier fees, please see this link.
Considering the high volume of traffic we send daily from Aloware, we charge all these carrier fees as a lump sum to your account nightly.
Phone number look-up (LRN) charges
Every time you add a contact to Aloware, we perform a "lookup" to determine the phone number's type (wireless, landline, voip, other) and it's approximate location (US, international, state and city). This is an automatic charge that applies whenever a new contact is added to Aloware and is $0.002 per contact. These charges are made against your credit balance as they happen.
Answering Machine Detections (AMDs), spam lookup, fax
AMDs, spam lookup, and fax services are each billed per occurrence and charged through Aloware credits.
Transcription
Aloware uPro comes with 5,000 minutes of our AI transcription product. If you exceed these minutes, each additional minute will cost you $0.03 and is paid for by Aloware credits.
Automations
Aloware a highly integrated product to CRMs, and on top of that comes with tools and APIs that you can automate outreach to your prospects. As we said above, every call or message sent by an automation (defined as non-human-agent) is charged per-piece to your credits. The most notable automations include:
Sending an SMS/MMS broadcast - all broadcasts are charged per segment.
API/ Zapier - using our SMS API to send messages is charged per segment.
HubSpot workflow SMS - sending text messages using our HubSpot workflow integration is charged per segment.
Aloware sequences - any call or text initiated by our Sequence+ product is charged per minute and per-segment by credits.
International calls and texts
International calls and texts are billed separately and deducted from your Aloware credit balance as they occur, so you only pay for what you use without any recurring fees.
Unlike local calls and texts, which may be included in your plan, international communications have varying costs based on different carrier fees and regulations. You can view the prices in the account menu under international pricing.
Find out more about international pricing in this guide.
AloAi text bot
The AloAi Text Agent is free to activate and enroll. There is no per-enrollment charge for inbound or outbound contacts. You only pay for the automated SMS segments the agent sends during a conversation, charged per segment to your Aloware credits at the rate set by your plan.
Plan | Base Fee | Rate |
iPro + AI | $0 | 2.0¢ per segment |
uPro + AI | $0 | 1.5¢ per segment |
xPro + AI | $0 | 1.0¢ per segment |
Messages sent through AloAi Text Agents also incur standard carrier SMS fees, the same as other automated messages.
AloAi voice agent
AloAi Voice Agents are billed per minute of AI talk time, deducted from your Aloware credits. The per-minute rate depends on the voice model tier you select when configuring the agent.
Tier | Rate | Best for |
Basic | 10¢ per minute | Affordable voice-to-voice AI agents for assistants, support workflows, and task automation. |
Premium | 20¢ per minute | Fast, lower-latency agents with balanced cost for everyday customer interactions. |
Ultra Premium | 50¢ per minute | High-performance, most natural conversations for sales or high-end assistants. |
How billing works:
Inbound calls are billed per minute once the AI joins the call.
Calls are rounded up to the next full minute, with a 60-second minimum. For example, a 70-second call is billed as 2 minutes.
Credits are deducted after a call ends. If your balance reaches zero, calls in progress finish, but no new calls start until you reload credits.