What does a question cost?
One credit for a question you type. The standing reads on the opening screen are free for every account and do not touch your balance. If an answer fails before it lands, the credit is put back.
Ask Helious: Credits, Standing Reads and What a Question Costs
Ask Helious is the assistant built into the terminal. It reads the desk you are already looking at, so an answer comes from the live tape rather than from a model's memory, and it shows the numbers it used and links what it read. The launcher sits in the bottom right of the [terminal](/), marked Ask Helious.
What is free and what costs a credit
The standing reads on the opening screen are answered for every account, all day, and cost nothing. They are the questions a desk asks first: what moved overnight, what stocks and Treasuries are doing, and what is due next. A question you type yourself costs one credit. If it fails before an answer lands, the credit goes back.
What each plan includes
Pro includes 30 credits a month and Ultimate includes 200. Free and Starter accounts can read the standing answers, delayed, but cannot type a question. Plan credits reset on your billing date, the same date the subscription tab shows as Access through, not on the first of the month. There is no rollover: a new period sets the allowance rather than adding to what is left of the old one.
The daily cap
Plan credits are capped by the day as well as by the month, at 15 a day on Pro and 50 a day on Ultimate. The cap is there so one busy afternoon cannot spend a whole month. Bought credits are not capped at all, which is what a pack is for.
Buying more
Packs are bought inside the terminal, under Account and then Subscription, or from the Ask Helious panel itself when you run out: 20 credits for USD 9.99, 50 for 19.99, 125 for 39.99 and 300 for 79.99. A pack is a one-off charge and nothing renews. Bought credits never expire, and they are spent only after your plan credits are gone, so a pack is never wasted.
What it will and will not do
It answers on the market data, the news feed, releases, auctions, the curve and Fed speakers, and it says where each figure came from. It describes what the data shows. It is not investment advice, it does not take positions, and it will tell you when it does not have something rather than reach for it.
You can ask it to remember a position. Under Account and then Preferences, set up to three, each a side and an instrument, such as long ZN. The position is sent with each question you type so the answer can speak to it, and no size, entry or stop is kept. The standing reads on the opening screen ignore it. Clear it from the same place, or with the cross beside it in the Ask Helious panel.
FAQ
When do my credits come back?
On your billing date, not on the first of the month. The subscription tab shows the same date twice, as Access through and as Plan credits reset, because they are the same date: the allowance runs with the period you pay for.
Do unused credits roll over?
Plan credits do not. A new period sets the allowance to 30 on Pro or 200 on Ultimate rather than adding to the remainder. Credits you bought in a pack are different: those never expire and carry forward until you spend them.
I moved from Pro to Ultimate. What happens to my credits?
You are on 200 the same day, not at the end of the month. The unused part of the Pro period is not lost either: it is added to the first Ultimate period as extra days, worked out on price.
Can I use Ask Helious on the free plan?
You can read the standing answers, which arrive an hour behind on a free or Starter account. Typed questions come with Pro and Ultimate, because they read the live desk and a free account does not have live data.
Why did it say I was out of credits when I still had some?
The daily cap on plan credits, 15 on Pro and 50 on Ultimate, is separate from the monthly allowance. Bought credits are not capped, so a pack keeps you going for the rest of the day.