Credits, Pricing, and Refunds at Acquired Data, Explained

Everything on Acquired Data — skip traces, property pulls, buyer profiles, add-ons — is priced in one currency: credits. This post explains why, what things cost, when a pack beats a subscription, and exactly when credits come back to you automatically. Billing should never be a surprise, so here's the whole model.

Why credits

Different operations have wildly different underlying costs — a bulk trace row and a full property record with valuation data aren't remotely the same product. A single credit balance means you buy once, at volume pricing, and spend across everything without juggling separate meters. It also makes comparing operations easy: every price below is in the same unit.

What things cost

Packs vs. subscriptions

Credit packs are one-time purchases with volume pricing: $0.019 per credit at 10,000, sliding down to $0.010 at 100,000 or more. Pack credits never expire. Subscriptions deposit credits monthly: 30,000 for $360, 60,000 for $600, 100,000 for $900, or 200,000 for $1,600 — that's $0.012 down to $0.008 per credit.

The math on when each wins: at around 10,000 credits a month of steady usage, a 10k pack costs $190 while the smallest listed subscription (30k/$360) buys far more than you need — packs win unless you'll grow into the allotment. At a steady 30,000 a month, the subscription gets you credits at $0.012 versus $0.013–$0.019 buying packs of that size, and it wins cleanly. The rule of thumb: predictable monthly volume of 30k+ favors a subscription; spiky or occasional usage favors packs, because those credits sit in your account indefinitely. You can also combine them — subscribe for your baseline and top up with packs in heavy months.

One line-item to know about: card payments carry a 3% processing fee, which you'll see itemized at checkout and on your invoice.

The two buckets

Your balance is really two buckets. Monthly credits come from a subscription and reset each billing cycle. Purchased credits come from packs and persist until spent. When you run a job, monthly credits are drawn down first — the expiring bucket before the permanent one — so subscribers never waste pack credits on usage a subscription would have covered. Your balance page and GET /api/v1/me both show the split.

When credits come back — and when they don't

Credits are charged up front when you submit work. Refunds are automatic in three cases:

• Failed jobs. If a job errors out, every credit it charged is returned. No support ticket needed.
• Shortfalls. If a job delivers fewer billable records than you were charged for, the difference is refunded automatically.
• Unmatched enrichment. Enrichment lookups that find no match refund their credits.

The honest exception: unmatched rows in a bulk skip trace are not refunded. Each row costs 1 credit whether or not it matches, because the matching attempt itself is the work being performed. With an advertised 98% match rate the unmatched slice is small, but it's real, and you should budget for it rather than be surprised by it. If a specific record matters enough that you only want to pay on match-quality terms, that's a reason to review results before re-running rather than blindly re-tracing.

Reading your invoice history

Every purchase — packs, subscription charges, and the 3% card fee as its own line — lands in your invoice history in the billing section of the dashboard, alongside a ledger of credit movements: charges when jobs start, refunds when the automatic cases above fire. If a number in your balance ever looks off, the ledger is the place to reconcile it; every credit in or out has a row.

Next steps

For plan details, checkout flow, and managing your subscription, see the credits and billing guide.