Mandrill API behaviour at hourly and monthly limits

[Kafkaah]

Hi,

I have tested that all messages sent using the Mandrill API that are beyond the hour limit are marked "queued" and generate the appropriate "status" in the response object.

A few questions:

1. How long are the messages above the hour limit queued before being sent (until next top of the hour?)?
   
2. When a call beyond the 12 000 monthly free limit is made, how does the API behave?
   
• Are the message queued?
• And if so, for how long?
• If not, what "status" will be sent back in the response object?
3. To prevent hitting the monthly limit do I need to keep track of the total count of emails sent, or is there a way through the API to get the current remaining monthly quota?
   
4. If I need to keep track of the total count, when is the monthly reset date (first day of the month at Midnight Eastern Time presumably)?
   

Thanks!

[Kaitlin]

If messages are queued, they'll be sent at the next hour.  If you have more queued than your hourly limit at that time, they'll be held until the following hour, etc.

If you hit the 12,000 limit on a free plan, messages will be queued for up to 3 days (we hard-stop sending at the 12,000 ceiling).  If you upgrade to a paid account within that timeframe, they'll start sending out again, limited again by the hourly quota for the account. 

If you exceed the base emails in a given month for a paid plan, we'll periodically debit your account balance based on your usage, and when your balance drops below $0 we'll charge your credit card on file to bring the balance to $5 (by default). You can configure the thresholds in your account's billing settings (so you can adjust it so that if your balance drops below $10, we'll rebill to bring the account balance to $100, or some other amounts you choose).  If your balance drops to $0 and we're unable to charge the credit card on file, the mail will be queued until the credit card information is updated, again queued for a maximum of 3 days.

The reset date for a free account is the day of the month that your account was opened - midnight UTC.

The reset date for monthly accounts is the day of the month that monthly billing began - midnight UTC.

We'll look at surfacing the reset date and the number of emails sent in a given month via the API as well. You can see the number of emails you've sent in a given month in the account, for now, on the dashboard.

[Kafkaah]

Precise, complete, many thanks!