How charges are calculated
emnify pricing is based on a monthly fee for each SIM card. Each SIM comes with an amount of included data, and as long as your devices stay within that amount, there are no extra charges. If a device uses more than its included data, you can let it keep going, and the extra usage is charged.
The model is close to a consumer mobile plan: a monthly subscription with an included allowance, additional usage charged at a set rate, and the option to share one allowance across several SIMs the way a family plan does.
This page explains how each charge on your invoice is worked out. To see the resulting figures for your own account, go to Billing in your Workspace settings.
Billing period
The billing period is the calendar month, from 00:00:00 on the first day of the month to 23:59:59 on the last day of the same month.
- Only data and SMS usage inside the calendar month counts toward that month’s invoice.
- Only SIMs active during the calendar month are included in that month’s invoice.
- Usage is assigned to a billing period based on the timestamps recorded by the network.
- Data, SMS, and SIM charges aren’t prorated.
What emnify measures
Three quantities are tracked during the billing period and combined on your invoice:
Each one is calculated independently, then priced using the terms agreed in your contract.
SIM charges
Billable SIMs
A SIM is billable for a billing period if it was in the Active or Enabled state at any point during the calendar month.
That applies regardless of:
- How long the SIM was active
- Whether the SIM was deactivated later in the same month
This is why a SIM you activated briefly, or suspended partway through the month, still appears on the invoice. The Monthly invoiced SIMs report shows exactly which SIMs were counted.
SIMs in factory test mode aren’t charged a hosting fee, and their data doesn’t count against your allowance.
SIM hosting fee
The SIM hosting fee is a per-SIM charge applied to each billable SIM. The total depends only on how many SIMs were billable, not on how much data or SMS they used.
Depending on your contract, the fee is either:
- Fixed, meaning the same rate per SIM whatever your fleet size.
- Tiered, meaning the rate per SIM depends on how many SIMs were active. Larger deployments move into a lower tier.
Only one of the two applies to your account at a time.
Data plan fee
Each billable SIM is associated with the data plan most recently assigned to it during the billing period. The latest assignment is used deliberately, so that you can change a SIM’s coverage or data plan mid-month to improve pooling and lower your total.
For each data plan, the monthly allowance fee per SIM is multiplied by the number of billable SIMs on that plan.
For example, if a data plan has a monthly allowance fee of 3.00 per SIM and 50 SIMs are on that plan during the billing period, the total data plan fee for that plan is 150.00 in your invoicing currency.
Enterprise contracts can include tiered discounts on the data plan fee, where the per-SIM fee drops as the number of SIMs on the plan grows.
The Data Plan Pooled Allowance including Fees table in the Monthly invoiced SIMs report shows the per-SIM fee, the SIM count, and the pooled allowance for each of your data plans.
Data charges
What counts as data usage
Data usage is all information a device sends or receives over the mobile network. Both directions count, so a device that sends 2 MB and receives 1 MB has used 3 MB.
Internal mobile network activity that only maintains connectivity isn’t billed. Zero-rated data, including factory test mode traffic, is excluded before billing.
A report’s total usage figure isn’t an invoice figure. For why the two differ, see How usage is counted.
How usage is grouped
Usage is grouped for billing in two steps:
- By data plan. Usage is first grouped by the data plan assigned to each SIM, so that the right allowance and pricing apply. Two data plans can cover the same coverage area with different allowances, so grouping by coverage area alone would mix them up.
- By coverage area. Within each data plan, usage is grouped by the network operator that carried the traffic, and each operator is then mapped to the coverage area it belongs to. Rates are defined per coverage area, not per operator.
The result is a usage total for each combination of data plan and coverage area, which is what gets rated.
Coverage policies control where a device is allowed to connect. Your data plan controls what you pay. Two groups of devices on different coverage policies but the same data plan share one allowance, one set of rates, and one pooling calculation.
How excess data is calculated
Once usage is totalled per data plan and coverage area, emnify works out how much of it exceeded the included allowance. The method depends on your data plan type.
The same total usage can produce very different charges depending on which type you’re on.
Pooled allowance example
The pooled allowance is the per-SIM allowance multiplied by the number of billable SIMs, and excess is calculated once for the whole pool.
With a 10 MB pooled data plan and three SIMs, the pooled allowance is 30 MB:
Total usage is 32 MB, so excess consumption is 2 MB.
Fixed allowance example
Each SIM has its own allowance, and excess is calculated per SIM, then added up.
With a 10 MB fixed allowance data plan:
Total excess consumption is 10 MB, even though the same 32 MB was used as in the pooled example.
Pay-per-use example
There’s no allowance at either the SIM level or the pool level, so all usage is billable.
The same three SIMs using 10 MB, 20 MB, and 2 MB produce 32 MB of excess consumption. This holds regardless of how many SIMs you have or how the usage is spread across them.
Rates for excess data
Excess data is charged per coverage area. Each coverage area has a list rate for mobile data, and your contract can replace it with a negotiated rate for that coverage area. Where a negotiated rate applies, it’s used instead of the list rate.
The rate that applied to a session is recorded in the traffic logs when the usage happens, and that’s the rate used when the invoice is calculated.
SMS charges
SMS is charged per message and per coverage area. There are no SMS allowances and no pooling, so the calculation involves fewer steps than for data.
- Only mobile-originated SMS, meaning messages sent by the SIM, are charged. Messages received by the SIM may be tracked but aren’t billed unless your contract says otherwise.
- Each message is associated with the SIM that sent it and the operator that delivered it.
- Each operator is mapped to its coverage area, messages are totalled per coverage area, and the total is multiplied by that coverage area’s SMS rate.
Other charges
Besides SIM, data, and SMS charges, your invoice can include:
Check your charges in the emnify Portal
For questions about how your own invoice was calculated, contact your CSM.