Billing

Colistor has two subscription models that can work independently or alongside each other. Understanding which one applies to you makes it easy to keep your team's access running smoothly.

Two ways to subscribe

Account subscription (your plan)

When you create an account you choose a plan that includes a number of seats. Each seat covers one member's access to your account's circles. You pay for the seats and assign them to the people you invite.

Best for teams, families, or groups where one person manages and pays for everyone.
Seats can be reassigned at any time — remove from one member and give to another.
The account owner always occupies the first seat. It cannot be removed.

Personal subscription

Any individual user can subscribe personally to Colistor. A personal subscription is portable — it grants that person full circle access in every account they belong to, without consuming any of those accounts' seats.

Best for individuals who join multiple accounts (work, personal, community) and prefer to manage their own billing.
A paying user brings their own access when they accept an invitation. The inviting account does not need to assign them a seat.
Colistor detects a personal subscription automatically at invitation-accept time.

How seat consumption works

When someone accepts an invitation, Colistor decides their funding source in this order:

Does the invited user have an active personal subscription? Yes → they join as self-funded. No seat is consumed from your account.
Was the invitation seat-funded and is a free seat available? Yes → a seat is assigned automatically from your plan.
Neither condition is met? The member joins without a seat or personal subscription. They can log in but will not see any circle content until one of the above conditions becomes true.

This means you can safely invite a paying Colistor user without worrying about seat quotas — their subscription covers them everywhere.

Managing your account subscription

Go to Account → Billing to:

View your current plan, number of seats, and renewal date.
Upgrade or downgrade your plan.
Add or change your payment method.
Download past invoices as PDF.
Cancel your subscription (access continues until the period ends).

Checking seat usage

The Members page shows how many seats are in use. Each member row displays one of:

| Badge | Meaning | |---|---| | 🔵 Siège du compte | Funded by one of your plan's seats | | 🟢 Abonnement personnel | The member pays for themselves — no seat consumed | | 🔴 Aucun abonnement actif | No seat and no personal subscription — no circle access |

The number of free seats remaining is shown above the invite form. When all seats are taken you can still invite people — they will join as self-funded if they have a personal subscription, or without circle access if they do not.

Managing a personal subscription

Personal subscriptions are managed from your profile settings, not from the Account Billing page. There you can:

View your current plan and next billing date.
Upgrade, downgrade, or cancel.
Update your payment method.
Download your personal invoices.

Frequently asked questions

I have 0 free seats. Can I still invite someone? Yes. If the person you invite already has a personal Colistor subscription, they will join as self-funded and no seat is consumed. If they do not, they can still accept the invitation and will need to subscribe personally before accessing circles.

A member's subscription expired. What happens? They will lose circle access on the next session load after their billing period ends. They still appear in your Members list with a 🔴 badge. You can assign them an account seat to restore their access, or ask them to renew their personal subscription.

Can I tell whether someone has a personal subscription before inviting them? Not directly — subscription details are private to each user. However, when they accept the invitation the correct badge will appear automatically. If it shows 🟢 they are self-funded and your seat quota is unaffected.

What is the difference between cancelling a subscription and removing a member? Cancelling a subscription (account or personal) ends the billing. Access continues until the period expires, then stops. Removing a member from the Members page immediately revokes their access regardless of any active subscription they may hold.

Do I need both an account subscription and a personal subscription? Not necessarily. If you are the owner of a single account and all your members are covered by seats, an account subscription alone is sufficient. A personal subscription makes sense if you want your own access to be independent of any specific account's seat quota — for example if you join multiple accounts that you do not own.