What is AutoEntry's Credit System?
AutoEntry uses a credit-based pricing model where every document you process consumes a specific number of credits from your monthly allowance. It's positioned as "pay as you go" flexibility, but in practice, it creates a metered usage system that accounting firms constantly monitor.
Here's how credits are consumed per document type:
Plans range from $12/month (50 credits) to $450/month (2,500 credits). When you exceed your monthly limit, you can purchase additional credits at a 10% premium—or upgrade your plan mid-month.
The 7 Drawbacks of Credit-Based Pricing
1. Unpredictable Monthly Costs
Your bill fluctuates based on client volume. A busy month means higher costs. Tax season? Expect cost spikes you can't budget for.
2. Usage Anxiety ('Should I Process This?')
Every document becomes a micro-decision. Should I process this 8-page statement now or wait until next month? This mental overhead slows down workflows.
3. Credits Expire After 90 Days
Unused credits don't roll over indefinitely. As of September 2025, credits expire within 3 months—even if you pause your subscription. You lose what you paid for.
4. 10% Overage Penalty When You Exceed Limits
Go over your monthly allowance? AutoEntry charges a 10% premium on overage credits (up to 200% of your plan limit). That's a penalty for doing more work.
5. Tax Season Cost Spikes
January through April brings 2-3x normal document volume for most firms. Credit-based pricing means your costs spike exactly when you're busiest.
6. Constant Credit Tracking Overhead
You're monitoring credit balances, calculating how many statements you can process, deciding when to upgrade. It's administrative friction every single month.
7. Price Increases (September 2025)
All AutoEntry plans increased in September 2025. Credit-based models give vendors flexibility to raise per-unit pricing without changing plan structure.
Real Cost Analysis: What You Actually Pay
Let's break down what credit-based pricing actually costs for a typical bookkeeping firm processing client bank statements. Remember: bank statements consume 3 credits per page.
| Plan Tier | Monthly Price | Credits Included | Bank Statement Pages | Cost Per Page |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | $12/month | 50 credits | ~16 pages | $0.75/page |
| Professional | $89/month | 500 credits | ~166 pages | $0.54/page |
| Business | $225/month | 1,500 credits | ~500 pages | $0.45/page |
| Enterprise | $450/month | 2,500 credits | ~833 pages | $0.54/page |
| Zera Books | $79/month | Unlimited | Unlimited pages | $0.00/page |
Example: 30-Client Firm
A bookkeeping firm processing 30 clients with an average of 4-page bank statements per month:
Tax Season Cost Spikes: When You Need It Most
January through April is when accounting firms process 2-3x their normal document volume. Clients need year-end statements. Tax preparers need complete transaction histories. Everyone is racing against deadlines.
This is exactly when credit-based pricing hurts most:
AutoEntry: Variable Costs
- •Normal month: 360 credits ($89 plan)
- •Tax season month: 900 credits needed
- •Must upgrade to $225 plan or pay overage fees
- •4 months of elevated costs = $900 total
Zera Books: Predictable
- •Normal month: $79/month
- •Tax season month: $79/month
- •Process 10x volume if needed—same price
- •4 months of tax season = $316 total
Tax Season Savings
With Zera Books, you save $584 during tax season alone compared to upgrading AutoEntry plans. No emergency upgrades. No overage anxiety. Just unlimited processing when you need it most.
Running Out of Credits Mid-Month: The Workflow Killer
Here's a scenario every AutoEntry user has experienced: It's the 18th of the month. You have 42 credits remaining. A client just sent you their 6-page bank statement. That's 18 credits—but you have 4 more clients to process this month.
Now you're doing mental math:
- 1.Do I process this statement now and risk running out completely?
- 2.Do I ask the client to wait until next month? (Unprofessional)
- 3.Do I upgrade my plan mid-month and overpay for credits I won't use?
- 4.Do I pay the 10% overage penalty and eat the extra cost?
This is usage anxiety in action. Instead of focusing on client work, you're rationing software credits like they're a scarce resource. Meanwhile, Zera Books users process the statement immediately with zero mental overhead.
The Unlimited Advantage
With unlimited processing, every decision becomes simpler: Client sent a statement? Process it. Need to re-run a conversion? No problem. Want to process year-end statements for all 50 clients in one day? Go ahead.
You're paying for a tool that works for you—not a metered utility you're constantly monitoring.
Usage Anxiety and Tracking Overhead
Credit-based pricing introduces a hidden cost that doesn't appear on your invoice: the mental overhead of tracking usage.
Tasks You Shouldn't Be Doing
- Checking credit balance before processing documents
- Calculating whether you can afford to process this client now
- Deciding which plan tier you need next month
- Explaining to clients why their work is delayed
- Monitoring credit expiration dates (90 days)
What You Should Be Doing
- Processing client documents the moment they arrive
- Delivering fast turnaround times to impress clients
- Growing your client base without cost anxiety
- Focusing on high-value advisory work
- Building efficient, scalable workflows
This is the invisible cost of "pay as you go" pricing. Every processing decision comes with a calculation. Every busy month comes with budget anxiety. Professional accounting firms need tools that get out of the way—not create new administrative burdens.
Credit Expiration: Losing What You Paid For
As of September 2025, AutoEntry introduced a new policy: credits expire after 90 days, even if you pause your subscription. This means unused credits you've paid for simply disappear.
Expiration Scenarios
Scenario 1: Slow Month
You're on the 500-credit plan ($89/month) but only use 200 credits in a slow month. The remaining 300 credits start their 90-day countdown. If you don't use them within 3 months, they're gone.
Scenario 2: Paused Subscription
You pause your subscription for 2 months during summer slowdown. When you return, any credits older than 90 days have expired—even though you paid for them and intentionally saved them.
Scenario 3: Over-Purchase
You upgrade to a higher tier "just in case" during tax season. Once tax season ends, you're racing to use credits before they expire or accepting that you've overpaid.
Compare this to Zera Books' unlimited model: There's nothing to expire because there's nothing to track. Every month gives you unlimited processing capacity. Use it or don't—your subscription value doesn't degrade.
Zera Books' Unlimited Alternative
Zera Books was built specifically to eliminate the drawbacks of credit-based pricing. Instead of tracking usage, we focus on what actually matters: helping you process financial documents faster and more accurately.
$79/month
Unlimited Everything
- Unlimited bank statement conversions
- Unlimited financial statements
- Unlimited invoice processing
- Unlimited check processing
- AI transaction categorization
- Multi-account auto-detection
- Client management dashboard
- Direct QuickBooks/Xero integration
- Batch processing (50+ documents)
- 99.6% extraction accuracy
What "Unlimited" Actually Means
No usage tracking: Never check a credit balance again. Process documents the moment they arrive.
Predictable costs: Budget $79/month. Whether you process 10 statements or 1,000 statements, your cost stays the same.
Scale without anxiety: Take on new clients without worrying about hitting usage limits or paying overage fees.
Tax season ready: Handle 3x normal volume during busy months without your software bill tripling.
No expiration: There are no credits to expire. Your subscription gives you unlimited processing capacity every single month.
Technology That Powers Unlimited
Zera Books can offer unlimited processing because of Zera AI—our proprietary machine learning model trained on 2.8+ million bank statements and 420,000+ invoices. Unlike template-based systems that require manual setup, Zera AI dynamically recognizes any bank format without training.
This efficiency means we can process documents at scale without per-unit costs spiraling. We pass those savings to you as predictable, unlimited pricing.
Why Accounting Firms Choose Unlimited Over Credits
Financial Benefits
- Predictable monthly costs (budget exactly $79)
- No tax season cost spikes
- No overage penalties (10% fees eliminated)
- Save $146-$371/month vs comparable AutoEntry plans
Workflow Benefits
- Zero usage tracking overhead
- Process documents immediately (no "should I wait?" decisions)
- Scale to 100+ clients without cost anxiety
- Re-run conversions as needed (no wasted credits)
