Creator Pro

Creator Pro is a paid plan for one project. It costs $4.99 a month or $39.99 a year, in US dollars, with tax included. Your first Pro plan starts with a 30-day free trial. Every project has its own plan, so Pro on one film does nothing for your others. A project without Pro is on the free plan, and everything else in Your projects stays free, including the figures on the Overview's Page card.

This guide covers what Pro adds, where to get it, the free trial, checking out on Stripe, the plan line in the sidebar, managing billing, what happens when a payment fails or Pro ends, and the emails Pro sends you.

What Pro adds

The Get Pro dialog lists what Pro adds today:

• "A contact form on your page, with every message kept in one inbox". Visitors write to you from your public page without seeing your address. Each message is emailed to you and kept on the project's Messages tab. See Messages.
• "Stats for views, visitors, link clicks and where visitors came from", on the project's Stats tab. See Stats.
• "Take the Made with FilmScorecard footer off your page", with a switch on the Page tab's Design tab. See Editing your page.

On a free project:

• Messages and Stats each carry an indigo Pro pill in the sidebar. Opening either one shows a card describing the tool, with Get Pro and the price line "$4.99 a month or $39.99 a year for this page". Nothing else is on the tab.
• The Contact form block can still be added to your page, but it is marked Pro in the builder and does not appear on your public page.
• The Made with FilmScorecard footer is always on.

Stats are counted for every public page, free or Pro. Getting Pro shows you the days before you had it too.

The Creators page lists one more Pro tool, "A one-sheet PDF built from your page", marked Coming soon. It is not part of Pro yet, and the Get Pro dialog does not list it.

Where Get Pro is

Every Get Pro button opens the same dialog, for the project you are on:

None of them appears on a project that already has Pro.

Getting Pro

1. Press Get Pro. Get Pro for your title opens, with Yearly chosen.

2. Choose a plan from the two cards:

   • Yearly: $39.99 a year, "Save $19.89 against monthly";
   • Monthly: $4.99 a month, "Cancel any time".

3. Read Pro adds and the line under it, which states what you will pay:

   • on your first Pro plan: "Free for 30 days. Then $39.99 a year from date until you cancel. Cancel before then and you pay nothing." The date is 30 days from today. With Monthly chosen it reads "Then $4.99 a month";
   • after that: "$39.99 a year, charged today and every year until you cancel.", or "$4.99 a month, charged today and every month until you cancel."

   Under it: "Pro covers this page. Each title has its own page and its own plan. Cancel any time from this page. Prices are in USD and include tax. Payment is handled by Stripe."

4. Press Start free trial, on your first Pro plan, or Continue to payment. The button stays busy until Stripe's checkout page opens. The dialog cannot be closed while it works.

5. On Stripe's page, enter your card and your billing address. Both are required, the trial included. Stripe uses the address to work out the tax inside the price. If FilmScorecard has given you a promotion code, you can enter it there.

6. Tick the box: "I agree to the Terms. Pro starts right away and renews automatically until I cancel." Terms opens the Terms of Use. Then confirm on Stripe's page.

Stripe brings you back to the tab you pressed Get Pro on. See Coming back from Stripe.

Cancel, in the dialog, closes it and nothing happens. Leaving Stripe's page without paying brings you back with nothing changed: the project stays on the free plan. Stripe's page lasts about half an hour; after that, press Get Pro again.

Pro is paid by card. Stripe's page offers no bank transfer or other kind of payment.

The free trial

• There is one free trial per account, not per project. It goes with the first Pro plan you start on any of your projects. After that, every Get Pro dialog shows the charge line and Continue to payment, and you pay from the day you check out.
• A card is required to start it. Nothing is charged until the trial ends.
• Unless you cancel before it ends, the trial becomes a paid plan and your card is charged the price of the plan you chose. We email you 7 days before. See The emails Pro sends.
• Cancelling during the trial costs nothing. Pro stays on until the trial's last day and then ends. See Managing your plan.

Coming back from Stripe

• Stripe sometimes sends you back before it has told FilmScorecard. The plan line then reads Setting up Pro…, and the screen checks again by itself for 30 seconds. If Pro has still not arrived, it reads "Still setting up Pro. Check back in a minute." Meanwhile Get Pro does nothing on that project, so you cannot start a second plan by mistake.

• When Pro arrives, a message says so once:

  • "Pro is on for your title. Your free trial ends on date.", for a trial;
  • "Pro is on for your title. It renews on date.", for a paid plan.

  The Pro pills leave Messages and Stats, the tabs open, and the plan line shows your plan.

• If you closed the tab before you got back, Pro still arrives. There is just no message.

If Get Pro is refused

The reason shows at the top of the dialog, and nothing is charged:

The plan line

At the foot of the sidebar, above "A festival sees only the submission it received. Nothing else in this account is shared with it.", one line says which plan the project is on:

Dates read like Thu 14 Oct 2027.

• On any Pro plan, the pill and its words are one button that opens Pro for your title.
• Update card opens Stripe's form for changing your card.
• With the sidebar folded down to icons, the plan line is hidden. Unfold the sidebar to see it.
• At 1024 pixels wide and below, the plan line is in the panel Menu opens.
• If your plan could not be read, there is no plan line, no Pro pill and no count, and the Messages and Stats tabs say "Something went wrong" and "This tab didn't load." with Try again.

Managing your plan

Press the plan line's pill to open Pro for your title. It has two rows:

• Plan: "Pro, yearly · $39.99 a year" or "Pro, monthly · $4.99 a month".
• Status: the plan line's own words, such as "Renews date", "Trial ends date", "Ends date", or Payment failed in amber.

Close shuts it. Manage billing takes you to Stripe's billing page for your account. FilmScorecard does not change, cancel or charge a plan itself; all of that happens on Stripe's page:

• Switching plans. Monthly to yearly takes effect at once, with credit for the unused part of the month. Yearly to monthly takes effect when the paid year ends, so until then the plan line still reads Pro, yearly.
• Cancelling. Pro stays on until the end of the period you have paid for, or the end of the trial, and does not renew. Partial periods are not refunded. Until that date you can undo the cancellation on the same page.
• Changing your card.
• Your invoices, to read and download.

Every Pro plan on your account is on that one page, each named "Pro for title", so you can tell your projects apart.

Stripe's link back returns you to the tab you were on, with Pro for your title open again. Once the project no longer has Pro, Get Pro for your title opens instead. A change you made on Stripe's page shows on the plan line once Stripe has passed it on. If the line still shows the old plan, refresh the page.

If Manage billing is refused, the reason shows at the top of the dialog; from Update card, it shows at the bottom of the screen:

When a payment fails

• Pro stays on while Stripe tries the payment again. The plan line turns amber, Payment failed with Update card, and the Pro for your title dialog's Status reads Payment failed.
• We email you once, after the first failed attempt. The retries that follow send nothing more.
• Update your card with Update card on the plan line, or with Manage billing in the dialog. The next attempt uses the new card.
• If every attempt fails, Pro ends. See When Pro ends.

When Pro ends

Pro ends when a cancelled plan reaches its end date, or when a renewal payment keeps failing. Then, straight away and with nothing to publish:

• The contact form leaves your public page. A visitor who still has the page open and sends a message is told "This page isn't taking messages right now."
• The Made with FilmScorecard footer comes back on your public page.
• Messages and Stats lock. Each shows its card with Get Pro again, and both carry the Pro pill in the sidebar.
• In the builder, the Contact form block is marked Pro again, and the footer switch is fixed on.

Nothing is deleted. Your messages, your stats, the Contact form block in your page and your footer choice are all kept. Messages from visitors also stay in the bell, as before.

To bring Pro back, press Get Pro and check out again. Your free trial has been used, so you pay from that day. The contact form and your footer choice come back on your public page at once, without publishing again, and so do your messages and stats.

The emails Pro sends

Each one goes to the address you sign in with, from FilmScorecard, and names Pro and the project in its subject:

The invoice is attached as a PDF. When it cannot be attached, the email links to it on Stripe instead.

Every email's button opens your project with Pro for your title open, or Get Pro once the plan has ended. It reads Manage Pro, Update card, Manage billing or Get Pro, depending on the email. From the dialog, Manage billing takes you to Stripe.

Support sessions

FilmScorecard's administrator can sometimes act as you to help with a problem. While they do, Pro cannot be bought, changed or cancelled. They see the same buttons you do, but Start free trial, Continue to payment, Manage billing and Update card all refuse with "Not available in a support session." Your card and your plan are only ever yours to change.

Related guides

• Your projects: the sidebar, its seven items and the plan line's place in it.
• Messages: the inbox Pro adds for your page's contact form.
• Stats: who your page reaches and where they came from.
• Editing your page: the Contact form block and the Design tab's footer switch.
• The public film page: what visitors see.
• The Terms, the Privacy Policy and the two role agreements: the Terms' Creator Pro section and the Privacy Policy's Payments section.