Why a click was or was not billed and paid

Explains: D-JL-02, D-JL-03, D-JL-06, D-CR-21, D-JL-09, D-JL-11, D-019-01, D-JL-17, D-JL-18, D-JL-19, D-DIST-18, D-022-35, D-022-37, D-022-38, D-CR-38, specs/021-budgets-and-rollups#req-012, specs/022-click-data-minimisation#req-010

Every recorded click carries one reason. The reason says why the click was or was not billed and paid, and whether the job seeker was sent on to the job. The Clicks screen shows it beside each of the latest clicks, and this page explains each one.

Billed and paid

Live

The link was in the publisher's feed when the click arrived. The customer is billed and the publisher is paid at the prices the link carries. The job seeker is sent to the job.

Removed from feed

The link had left the publisher's feed (its job left, or moved to another campaign). Inside 24 hours after it left the feed, the click is billed and paid exactly as a live click, because publishers work from cached feeds (D-JL-02). After 24 hours it is neither billed nor paid. Either way the job seeker is sent to the job's last known page. The reason is the same on both sides of the 24 hours.

Paid, not billed

Over budget

The click would have taken the campaign's or its customer's spend past its budget, or came after one that did, while its link was still billed and paid. The publisher is paid at its price; the customer is not billed, and the click's revenue is $0.00 (D-JL-09, specs/021 REQ-012). The budget is never exceeded on the customer's bill; you carry the publisher's cost. This reason is given by the settlement that measures spend against budgets, never at the moment of the click, and it is never counted as invalid traffic.

Neither billed nor paid, job seeker sent on

Duplicate

The same person had already made a paid click on this job inside your shop's click window (24 hours by default, D-CR-21). The repeat is neither billed nor paid (D-JL-06). The job seeker is still sent to the job.

Address ceiling

A click on this job from a network address that had already earned a paid click on the same job inside the click window. The repeat is neither billed nor paid (D-JL-06). The job seeker is still sent to the job.

Rate limited

A click from a network address that had already sent many clicks in a short time, counted across every job and every shop, not only this one. A person does not click that many jobs that fast; a crawler walking a whole feed does. The click is neither billed nor paid (D-022-35, D-022-37). The job seeker is still sent to the job. ClickFactor does not publish the number or the window (D-022-38); a shared office or network address that sends unusually many real clicks can cross it, and those clicks then appear here instead of as paid.

No address

A click that arrived without the network address ClickFactor's hosting adds to every request, so nothing could say who sent it. Without an address no limit can be held to one person, so the click is neither billed nor paid (D-CR-38, matching D-JL-06). The job seeker is still sent to the job. On ClickFactor's own hosting every click carries an address, so a click with this reason means something between the job seeker and ClickFactor changed; ClickFactor counts it as its own problem to fix.

Not a click

A request ClickFactor treats as not a person's own click, for example a link checker, a page loading the link as an image, a browser prefetching it, or a visitor a page sent on without their own click (D-JL-17, D-JL-18, D-JL-19). A request that does not show this is counted as a click. It is answered exactly as a click would be, recorded so the publisher's count can be shown, and neither billed nor paid.

Neither billed nor paid, page not found

Redirection stopped for the customer

A tenant admin, or ClickFactor, stopped redirection for this customer (D-DIST-18; Stopping redirection). From that moment every click on the customer's jobs is refused with a page-not-found, neither billed nor paid, with no 24-hour grace. Each refused click is still recorded, so you can show the publisher what it sent.

Redirection stopped for the feed

The same, for one of the customer's feeds. A stop on the whole customer takes precedence over a stop on one feed.

Destination refused

The job's landing page is one ClickFactor will not send a person to: a bad scheme, no domain, embedded credentials or control characters. The click is refused with a page-not-found and is neither billed nor paid (D-JL-11). The import never distributes such a page, so this should not arise with a real customer.

Never published

The link was created by a feed build that never finished publishing, so no publisher has ever received it. Refused, neither billed nor paid.

Retired

The link had left the publisher's feed and its redirect window had ended: seven days after it left or after its last click since then, whichever is later, and never more than 30 days after it left (D-JL-03). A visit to a retired link is a page-not-found. It is counted, but not recorded as a click, so a dead link can still be cleaned up.

Revoked

A link marked withdrawn. Refused, neither billed nor paid. Nothing in the console withdraws a link today.

Unknown

No such link exists. Refused, neither billed nor paid, and counted as a failure so a bad link in circulation shows up on the Clicks screen.