Purchasing and Subscriptions

What happened to the 90 day trial option?

We try to be as generous as we can with trial subscriptions. We want you to fully explore everything we have to offer and we know it takes time to build apps and workflows that include our utilities. When we initially rolled out the new Apptigent shop in 2022, we set a 3 month limit on the trial subscriptions, which at the time seemed like a good balance between time and discoverability. In order to do this in our subscription system, we had to allow automatically recurring monthly subscription renewals up to the 90 day limit. Unfortunately, this has caused a great deal of confusion as customers receive as many as three renewal notices for something they may have tried only for a few days then moved on to something else. Despite our best attempts to highlight that the renewal is for a free trial and there is no cost associated, we received a number of complaints and rightly so – it’s confusing and that’s not what we intended.

Looking deeper into the issue, we discovered that the vast majority of trial users reach the utilisation limit within the first 30 days so the extra two months is completely unnecessary. Based on this and the aforementioned feedback, we have decided to limit all trial periods to 30 days. But we don’t want to leave anyone hanging, so should you need more time to evaluate our products please open a support ticket and we can extend trials on a case-by-case basis. We hope this doesn’t cause you any inconvenience – if it does, we want to hear about it so please provide your feedback.

How do I upgrade to a new release?

We regularly release updates that include new or revised actions. In order to ensure that existing applications continue to function, new releases will supersede older ones but your apps, flows, and forms may not automatically be upgraded to the latest version depending upon the platform you use. We make a concentrated effort not to change existing action schemas (inputs and outputs) so we’re not introducing breaking changes to your apps. If we do need to change an action scheme, we will release a new version of the action, denoted by a “V” with a number in the name (such as “Text – Replace String V2”). This is a common approach across many API providers and although it can be a bit confusing to determine which version to use it ensures that our changes aren’t the cause of application failures.

Here’s what to expect on the different platforms we support:

  • Microsoft Power Platform – Updates to custom connectors roll out globally in a staggered fashion by region. If you don’t see an action in Power Apps or Power Automate that is listed in your API documentation, it’s likely that your region hasn’t received the updates yet. Give it a few days and check the gallery again. Once a new version is available, your existing flows and apps will not be automatically upgraded (this is done to preserve the integrity of existing solutions). To make use of the new actions, edit your flow or app and add them individually.
  • Salesforce – The approval and security review process can take some time, so it’s likely that we’re waiting impatiently just like you are to get our new actions deployed. We’ll mark the feature list page for Salesforce with a checkmark or video link as soon as we get word that our submission has been approved. You may also receive an email from us indicating that a new version is available (be advised we can only send this to the contact details we have for the organization in the Salesforce customer record not each individual user). Some changes will happen automatically (if, for example, we update the underlying Apex code or classes) but changes to action schemas will follow the same process as other platforms – edit each flow and add the new or updated actions as needed. Note that in cases where we need to update a picklist or other form-based control, we will also create a new “Vnumber” metadata element so we don’t impact existing forms.
  • Nintex – Download or copy the link to the latest version of the Swagger specification document on the API details page. Update the Apptigent PowerTools extension in Nintex Workflow Cloud with the latest version of the spec. New actions will then be displayed in the workflow designer.
  • Developer – Check the API details page for info about the new actions. You can begin using them right away. If your code is dependent upon our schemas or one of our published code samples you may need to refactor and recompile. We try to keep the sample libraries up to date but we do prioritize new functionality over sample code.

Which Power Tools subscription plan should I choose?

The first step is to try out one of our free or trial plans. You can cancel anytime before the expiration date to avoid billable charges.

If you do decide to upgrade to a paid plan or convert from a trial to a full subscription (and we hope you do), you’ll need to estimate the number of monthly API calls that will be generated from your application(s) (see the FAQ topic on API calls for more information), then pick the plan that is closest to that number. If you are unsure, contact us and we’ll help you figure it out. Remember, you can always start small then move up as your utilisation increases – if you need to change your plan on the fly, just drop us a line and we’ll walk you through it.

If your estimated utilisation doesn’t match any of our defined plans, contact Sales so we can either create a new plan tier or put together a custom Unlimited plan that meets your needs. We want you to get the most value from your subscription without overspending, so we’re happy to help in any way we can.

What does “API calls per day/month” mean?

Our API’s use a method knows as “rate limiting” to prevent DDoS and other malicious attacks from overwhelming our servers. Each plan allows a fixed number of requests for a given subscription in a single month-long period or, in the case of our trial plans, a fixed total number of requests over the lifetime of the subscription. Every time a defined API action is executed, such as translating a string or formatting a date, that counts as a single API call agains the subscription allocation. If a workflow, form or view as multiple actions, then the action count is cumulative for each form submission or workflow execution (note that failed actions do not count towards the total).

For example, if a Power Automate flow has a Power Tools Convert Currency action followed by a Power Tools Format Currency, then each time that flow is executed two API calls would be recorded and applied to the daily total. Once the total is reached, subsequent calls will return limit exceeded errors until the 24 hour period from first execution expires. Similarly, if a Logic Apps form has a button that converts area from acres to hectares using the Power Tools Convert Area action, each time the button is clicked the daily total will be incremented by one until the limit is reached.

To facilitate situations where utlisation is elastic or periods of significant spikes are expected (such as during peak holiday shopping times or end of month processing), contact Sales about switching to an Unlimited plan. An account specialist will review your situation and craft a bespoke plan that meets your requirements in the most affordable manner. Alternatively, upgrade via the customer portal to a plan with higher limits for one or more billing cycles then downgrade to a lower plan when utlisation returns to normal.

What is your cancellation policy?

Subscription products can be cancelled at any time using our online forms or by submitting a support ticket. Please be aware that we use third-party billing systems to process transactions, so there may be a delay in processing any applicable refunds. For monthly recurring subscriptions, cancellation during an active billing cycle will stop any further charges from accruing but won’t affect payments already made. For corporate purchase order and non-recurring cancellations, please open a support ticket so we can address your particular situation promptly.

Integration

How do I use Power Tools with ‘x’ platform?

Power Tools is a platform-agnostic API that follows the Open API standard for describing RESTful services. As such, it can be integrated into a wide range of platforms and custom applications. Where possible, we provide predefined connectors for popular platforms from Microsoft, Nintex, Salesforce and more. Search the marketplace, store or application gallery for your chosen platform to see if a plugin component already exists then check our knowledgebase for assistance installing and configuring the component. If a prebuilt component is not available, you may still be able to integrate Power Tools into your environment – search the knowledgebase for the desired platform and if there aren’t any results feel free to open a support ticket and we’ll do our best to help you out.

If you are building a custom application, review our API documentation to get familiar with our endpoints, then subscribe to a trial plan to test it out with your code. Any framework that allows REST calls over HTTPS with the ability to craft GET and POST requests with a JSON payload and supply custom header values for the API key should work just fine. Check our Github repo for code samples. Our development team primarily works with C#, Node.js, Apex, and JavaScript but we’ll try to help with other languages if you need assistance.

Technical

I am getting an error trying to convert speech to text, what could be the cause?

This is most likely due to the size of the input file. Each platform has different restrictions on file size and response timeouts. For example, Microsoft Power Platform imposes a strict 2 minute timeout on all responses via a connector whereas Azure Frontdoor allows a more generous 4 minute max response time. Based on extensive testing against the various infrastructure components our development team has identified an upper bound of 10MB uncompressed (.wav) and 1MB compressed (.mp3, .m4a, .ogg, etc.) for input audio files in a flow or app. This is under ideal conditions, using backend components all in the same Azure region so mileage may vary depending on your Power Platform tenant location.

Salesforce also imposes restrictions on the amount of information transmitted and received, although it seems to be less uniform. Sometimes, a 1MB compressed audio file will work, other times it will fail. It is important to note that Salesforce imposes limits on the size of files that can be transmitted and stored via Apex code. This may vary by org so check with your administrator to determine what the limitations are for your environment.

I’m getting a 400, 500, or other error code, what can I do?

Whenever an action fails, if the request has made it through to our backend systems it returns an HTTP status code 400 with an accompanying error message. Sometimes, these message can be a bit vague and it’s not clear what caused the problem. Check your platform logs to see if any additional information is provided there or, if possible, run the app or flow in debug mode for more granular error details (some platforms provide this option but some do not).

If you receive a specific error code other than 400, such as 401, 404, 503, or similar, then the response is coming from the various infrastructure layers between your application and our backend systems. This may include firewalls, load balancers, gateways, and other components, either within or without our hosting environment (many platforms have their own infrastructure for handling external connections). These issues can often be difficult to troubleshoot if you don’t have a development or network infrastructure background. Such errors are often transitory or intermittent, further complicating the issue. We can’t promise to solve every such incident, especially if the root cause is outside of the systems we control, but we will gladly help you troubleshoot. Just open and support ticket from our Help page, give us as much detail about the error as you can, and we’ll do our best to help track down the problem.

Customer Support

What things are covered in support?

We provide technical support for products and services marketed under the Apptigent brand. Open a ticket using our support system and we will do our best to resolve your issue in a timely manner. Please be aware that some products operate as “plug ins” for other systems that our out of our control, like Microsoft Power Automate, Azure Logic Apps or Salesforce, and there may be limits on what we can do as a third-party vendor. But we’ll certainly try to help as much as we can. For products marketed under partner brands, we will refer you to the partner for first-level support (technically, you are their customer, not ours) but if they need to escalate back to us for deeper troubleshooting we’ll get back in touch with you.