The Delivery Floor
The Delivery Floor is the one place in the Subscriber Exchange where money stands behind a delivery number. It is included with the Ultimate plan and works entirely on its own: nothing to enable, no claim to file, no support ticket.
In one sentence: if an Ultimate broadcast campaign finishes a cycle having delivered less than 80% of what it could realistically have delivered, the gap is credited back to you automatically.
The Delivery Floor applies to Ultimate plans only and to broadcast campaigns only. It is read from the tier frozen onto the campaign at submit time, not your tier today. If you are on another plan, or running a swap, none of this applies — see Plans, tiers and limits.
Why it exists
An exchange is a supply-and-demand system. Most cycles deliver in full, but a campaign can occasionally fall short through no fault of yours — the pool of matching hosts thins out, or too many campaigns chase the same slice of it that month.
Paying for the top plan should not mean absorbing that risk silently. The Delivery Floor turns an under-delivered cycle into an automatic make-good instead of a conversation.
How the floor is calculated
Three numbers, in this order.
1. What the cycle was entitled to
Ultimate's 18 included placements per cycle, plus any paid delivery boost on that campaign, then scaled by your reliability score exactly as the scheduler scaled it. This is what the exchange actually owed the campaign — not a headline number it was never going to deliver.
2. What the pool could actually have given you
The number of channels that genuinely matched the campaign: its content level, its topic and every targeting choice you made, measured with the same counting the reach estimate and the Why? diagnostic use.
The lower of these two numbers is what the floor measures against.
This is the guard that keeps the floor honest. If you target a slice where only three channels qualify, your campaign's realistic maximum is three placements — and delivering three is delivering everything available. Narrow targeting can never manufacture a shortfall, because the floor is capped by the pool you actually asked for.
3. The 80% line
The floor target is 80% of that realistic maximum, rounded. Deliver at or above it and nothing happens — the cycle performed. Deliver below it and the difference between what you got and the 80% line is the shortfall.
A worked example
- Your Ultimate campaign is entitled to 18 placements this cycle.
- 30 channels matched its level, topic and targeting, so the realistic maximum is 18 — the smaller of the two.
- The floor target is 80% of 18, which is 14.
- The cycle closes having delivered 9 placements.
- The shortfall is 14 minus 9, which is 5 placements.
- 5 placements at $0.50 each is a $2.50 make-good.
And a case where nothing is due:
- The same campaign, but your targeting was narrow enough that only 6 channels matched. The realistic maximum is 6, the floor target is 5, and the cycle delivered 6. That is full delivery — no make-good, and correctly so.
How the shortfall is priced
Each missing placement is valued at $0.50 — the market price of a placement on the exchange, taken from the paid delivery menu, where $0.99 buys 2 placements, $1.99 buys 4 and $2.99 buys 6.
The total is capped at the value of one full cycle's entitlement, so a make-good can never exceed what a complete cycle was worth in the first place.
How you are paid
The make-good arrives as Boost credit on your account — not as SubX credits, and not as cash.
That is deliberate. Compensating a delivery shortage with more exchange credits would push you to consume even more of the same scarce inventory that just fell short. Boost credit spends on a different product entirely, so the make-good is worth something immediately.
It appears as a credit on your Boost credit balance, described as a Delivery Floor make-good and naming the cycle, what was delivered, and the floor target it was measured against.
Timing
The floor is checked on a recurring sweep rather than at the instant a cycle ends.
- The cycle finishes — every placement has run or been closed out, and none remain scheduled.
- A settling period of at least two days passes, so late placements and takedowns are fully recorded before anything is measured.
- The sweep runs every six hours over cycles that settled between 2 and 60 days ago. If one fell below the floor, the credit is granted.
So expect a make-good a couple of days after a cycle closes, not the same hour. The check is safe to repeat: a cycle already made good is never paid twice, even if the sweep passes over it again.
What the Delivery Floor does not cover
| Situation | Covered? |
|---|---|
| An Ultimate broadcast cycle that under-delivered | Yes — automatically |
| A cycle that under-delivered because your targeting was narrow | No — the floor is capped by the pool you targeted |
| A cycle cut short because you cancelled the campaign | No — the cycle did not close on its own terms |
| A cycle during which the campaign was paused because you withdrew your last hosting channel | No — a paused campaign's cycle freezes rather than under-delivering, so the exchange did not fall short. This reaches backwards as well: an earlier cycle of the same campaign that had not yet been paid out when you withdrew is passed over too, and the sweep does not come back to it. Enrol a channel again and the next full cycle is covered as normal. See Hosting ads |
| Reach lost to a low reliability score | No — the entitlement is measured after the reliability haircut, so the floor promises no more than the exchange owed |
| A campaign that was declined in review | No — a declined ad has no cycle. The delivery-boost charge is refunded instead |
| A swap | No — a swap is a single 1:1 trade with no placement count |
| Any plan other than Ultimate | No — see Plans, tiers and limits |
| A cycle that settled more than 60 days ago | No — the sweep's scan is bounded, so an unmeasured old cycle stays unmeasured |
If something goes wrong
| What you see | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| A cycle looks short and no credit arrived after a few days | Delivery may have met the 80% line against the eligible pool, which is smaller than your entitlement | Press Why? on the campaign row and read the Matching channels count |
| The credit is smaller than you expected | The shortfall is measured against the realistic maximum, not the headline entitlement | Compare the eligible count with your placements |
| No credit and the diagnostic says nothing matched | The realistic maximum was zero, so there is nothing to make good | Widen your targeting or lower the level — see Targeting |
| You cannot find the credit | It lands on your Boost credit balance, not your wallet cash or your SubX credits | Check the Boost credit ledger |
Frequently asked
Do I have to claim it?
No. There is nothing to submit and nothing to enable. If a cycle qualifies, the credit lands on its own.
Can I be paid in cash instead?
No. The make-good is issued as Boost credit.
Why 80% and not 100%?
An exchange is not a guaranteed-inventory ad network — placements depend on real channels being available and willing. The 80% line is the point at which a cycle has stopped being normal variance and started being a genuine shortfall.
My cycle delivered nothing at all. What happens?
If the campaign had a realistic maximum above zero and delivered nothing, the whole 80% target is the shortfall and it is credited in full. If no channels matched your targeting, the realistic maximum was zero and there is nothing to make good.
I upgraded to Ultimate mid-campaign. Is the running cycle covered?
No. The floor reads the tier frozen onto the campaign when you submitted it. Campaigns you submit after upgrading are covered.
Related
- Delivery boosts — the menu the $0.50-per-placement price is taken from.
- Targeting — why a narrow filter caps what the floor can pay.
- Plans, tiers and limits — the full ladder, including which plan includes this floor.
- Running ads — the Why? diagnostic that shows your eligible pool.