Understanding Credits and Billing
Taikai App doesn't charge monthly fees. Instead, you buy credits and spend one credit for each competitor you approve. Credits never expire and work across all your tournaments — buy once, use whenever you need them.
The short version: 1 credit = 1 approved competitor registration. Your balance persists across tournaments. Credits don't expire.
Buying credits
Navigate to My Account → Credits to see your current balance and purchase a credit pack. Payments are processed securely via Stripe — Taikai App never stores your card details.
Credit packs
Four pack sizes are available. Larger packs have a lower per-credit cost:
Founding director pricing: The first 50 directors to purchase credits during beta lock in a permanent 20% discount off standard pricing — for life. If you join during beta, your rate never goes up even after beta ends. See Pricing for details.
When credits deduct
Credits deduct from your balance in exactly two situations:
- Approving a registration — When you approve a pending competitor, one credit is deducted. The credit comes from your account, not the competitor's.
- Pay-later registrations — If you enable pay-later mode (see below), credits still deduct at approval time. Whether the competitor pays you cash on the day is between you and them.
Credits do not deduct when:
- A competitor submits a registration (only pending at this point)
- You publish a tournament
- You generate brackets
- A competitor registers for multiple events — all events within one registration count as one credit
Insufficient credits: If your balance reaches zero, incoming registrations queue as pending and cannot be approved until you add more credits. Competitors are notified their registration is pending — they are not told why. Your tournament remains live and registrations continue to be accepted.
Refunds and unapprovals
If you unapprove a competitor (move them from approved back to pending), the credit used to approve them is automatically refunded to your balance. This works for individual unapprovals and bulk unapprovals.
Deleting an approved competitor also triggers a credit refund, but Taikai App requires you to unapprove first as a safety check — you can't delete an approved competitor in one step. This prevents accidental data loss.
Pay-later mode
Standard mode requires competitors to pay online (via Stripe) when they register. Pay-later mode accepts registrations without upfront payment — you collect fees in cash, check, or by whatever method you prefer on tournament day.
To enable pay-later, go to your tournament settings in the Tournament Manager and toggle Pay Later on. This affects all new registrations from that point forward.
Credits still deduct when you approve a pay-later registration — the credit system doesn't change, only the payment collection does. Your credit transaction history shows a note when credits come from pay-later approvals.
Founding directors
The first 50 directors to purchase credits during the beta period become founding directors. Founding directors receive:
- 20% off standard pricing, locked in permanently
- Priority support during their first tournament
- Early access to new features before general release
- A founding director badge on their tournament pages
There is no application process — simply be among the first 50 to complete a credit purchase during beta. The counter is visible on the Pricing page.
Transaction history
Every credit change is logged. Your transaction history shows:
- Purchase — Credits added via Stripe payment
- Usage — Credits spent approving competitors, with the tournament and competitor name
- Refund — Credits returned when unapproving competitors
- Grant — Complimentary credits added by Taikai App support
The history goes back to your first transaction and cannot be deleted. Export is available from the Credits page as a CSV.