Your organization has a number of seats. One member occupies one seat. This
covers where that number comes from, and how to raise it.
Where your allowance comes from
Three places, in this order:
- A staff override, if we set one — usually while an invoice is being
sorted out. - Capacity you bought: the seat count on a per-seat subscription (Team,
Institution), or a bundle or top-up. - Your plan’s own seat count, if you have bought no capacity.
Your organization page shows all of it: seats in use, seats allowed, and how
many remain.
We tell you before you run out
When you are close to your limit, the seat panel says so. This is deliberate:
the old behaviour was an invitation that quietly failed to take once every
seat was full, which is too late to do anything about.
Buying more
There are two routes, and your organization page shows the one that applies.
On a per-seat subscription: change the seat count
If you subscribed to Team or Institution seats, the seats are the quantity on
your subscription. Change seats on your organization page (or on the
billing page) sets a new total, up or down. Stripe invoices the difference
for the rest of the term straight away when you add seats, and credits it
against your next invoice when you remove them. The new allowance applies as
soon as Stripe confirms the count, which is immediate.
Two floors: the plan’s minimum (3 for Team, 25 for Institution), and the
number of members you currently have. Remove a member first to go below
that. The seat count can also be changed from the Stripe billing portal when
the portal configuration allows quantity updates; the button here works
either way.
Everything else: buy seats once, pro rata
If your organization bought a bundle, or is on a plan with a price (Plus, or
a courtesy grant of one), you can buy more seats yourself from your
organization page. Choose how many seats, see the price before you pay, and
pay.
You pay the rate you already agreed, not today’s list price. If your
10-seat package worked out at $1,000 a seat, more seats cost $1,000 each —
even if the package has been repriced since. With no bundle, the rate is your
plan’s own per-seat share: on Plus, an extra seat costs what Plus costs.
The charge is pro rata. Six months into an annual term, a seat costs about
half of a year’s rate, because that is how much of the year is left.
Your allowance rises when the payment clears, not when you land back on
the site. If you close the tab mid-payment nothing is lost: the seats appear
when the payment goes through.
At renewal
Top-up seats renew with the rest of your subscription, at the list price
current at renewal. The original rate holds for the remainder of the term you
bought it in, which is what you are paying for now.
Reducing your allowance
At renewal, by talking to us. Not mid-term, and there is no refund for seats
already paid for.
When your billing is through your Northern Vector account
Once dfrds’s billing moves to your Northern Vector account, Buy more seats
asks that account for the price: seats at the rate of your latest bundle or
top-up, pro rata to the end of its term, or, for an organization that has
bought none yet, a bundle to start with. A price holds for 15 minutes; after
that the page shows the new one before you pay. The seats count once the
payment clears, and they are held by the administrator who bought them: more
seats for the same organization come from that administrator’s billing.
When neither route applies
An organization on the Free plan, or on a plan that has no price yet, has
nothing to price a seat against. Your seat panel says so and points you at
us instead. Organizations we bill by invoice or purchase order are in the
same position for now: capacity is added by hand.
Refusals name the way out
An invitation that would exceed the allowance is refused on the spot, and the
message says which route adds a seat: change the seat count, buy more seats,
or free one by removing a member.
Freeing a seat instead
Removing a member frees their seat immediately. Their research stays where it
is — in the space it belongs to, not in the seat.