Attempt Settlement With Usage, Estimate or Release

Context

A provider can report usage, omit it or fail before answering. Request outcomes and accounting outcomes therefore need separate meanings.

Decision

After dispatch, attempt actual settlement for positive reported usage, an estimate for successful unmeasured work or zero release, while preserving interruption and persistence limits.

Alternatives Considered

Estimate-charge every unmeasured outage: It repeatedly bills customers for requests that never obtained a provider answer.

Release all work without reported usage: It hides charges for successful conversations whose usage was not measured.

Charge only successful conversations: Failed work can already have consumed billable units.

Consequences

Failed conversations can retain charges. Estimate settlement keeps monetary cost unknown rather than asserting zero on the request. Measured admitted usage can exceed allowance after admission. Cleanup releases after some real usage and can repeat a period release; it is not a complete accounting guarantee.