# How You Get Paid (and What You Pay For)

The word "billing" covers **two completely separate money flows** in Fours, and mixing them up is the most
common source of confusion for new customers. This page explains both in plain language.

---

## The two money flows

```d2
direction: right
flowA: "Flow A — marketplace revenue (money paid TO you)" {
  buyer: "Your buyer"
  cloud: "Cloud marketplace\nAWS / Azure / GCP"
  you: "You / your bank"
  suger1: Fours
  buyer -> cloud: pays
  cloud -> you: "disburses, minus marketplace fee"
  cloud -> suger1: "records the transaction" { style.stroke-dash: 4 }
}
flowB: "Flow B — AI-feature usage (money you pay Fours)" {
  you2: You
  suger2: "Fours AI"
  stripe: "Stripe invoice\nfree credits applied"
  you2 -> suger2: "use AI features"
  suger2 -> stripe: "metered per model, monthly invoice"
}
```

## Flow A — marketplace revenue (the cloud pays *you*)

When a buyer purchases your product on a cloud marketplace, **the cloud provider collects the payment**,
keeps its marketplace fee, and **disburses the rest to you**. Fours records the transaction so you can see
and reconcile it, but the money moves from the cloud to your bank — not through Fours.

A key timing detail — **cash timing is not accounting timing.** Your proceeds are paid on the cloud
provider's payout schedule, which can fall in a different period than when the sale closed: AWS and Google
Cloud pay after they collect the buyer's payment, while Microsoft pays Enterprise Agreement purchases in its
next payout cycle, often before it collects from the customer. When you *recognize* that revenue in your books is a separate question, answered by
your contract and by when you satisfy your performance obligations — not by the disbursement date. Fours
reports the cash stages separately so you can reconcile them against your own revenue-recognition schedule:
**Bookings → Billings → Cash Collected → Disbursed**. See
[Key Terms](/concepts/glossary/#selling-and-billing) for the definitions and the
[revenue lifecycle stage cards](/revenue/overview/#revenue-lifecycle-stage-cards) for where they appear in
the product.

→ Track this in [Multi-Channel Revenue](/revenue/), and read
[Cloud Commits and Drawdown](/concepts/commit-drawdown/) for how enterprise cloud commitments interact
with marketplace purchases.

## Flow B — AI-feature usage (you pay *Fours*)

If you use Fours' **AI features**, that usage is metered — model tokens, sandbox runtime and stored
files — priced by Fours, and taken off a credit balance, with **$100 of free credit each month** applied
automatically. A customer who doesn't use AI features owes nothing here. This is money you pay **to
Fours**, and it is entirely separate from the marketplace revenue above.

→ See [Billing](/insulin/billing/) for how AI usage is metered, credited, and charged.

---

## Quick comparison

| | Flow A — Marketplace revenue | Flow B — AI-feature usage |
|---|---|---|
| **Who pays whom** | Cloud marketplace pays **you** | **You** pay Fours |
| **What it's for** | Your customers' purchases of your product | Your usage of Fours' AI features |
| **How it's collected** | Cloud disburses to your bank | Taken off a credit balance; invoiced to the payment method on file |
| **Where to look** | [Multi-Channel Revenue](/revenue/) | [Billing](/insulin/billing/) |