
Stripe Atlas includes $5k in AWS credits – we recevied $1k - CoreSet
https://formcake.com/blog/stripe-atlas-includes-five-thousand-credits-this-is-what-we-got
======
patio11
(I work at Stripe.)

Here's the story on partner credits: A thing we do at Stripe Atlas is go to
companies in the ecosystem whose services we like and ask them to bid on the
opportunity to support a large cohort of Internet businesses. They then do so
and communicate this to us on, essentially, a handshake: we act as a channel
for them and in return they give our customers (and not us) some benefit.

Partners occasionally change their mind about internal thresholds for
marketing promotions, which sometimes moves their operational processes about
the deal that Stripe Atlas users will get going forward. They do not always
communicate this to us in real time.

As we've learned more about this over the years, we've tried to update our
language to convey that these sort of credits are up to the partners. (We have
seen customers get $5k or other amounts and, ultimately, that is at Amazon's
discretion.) I'll check later today to make sure we're using the newer "up to"
language throughout our docs.

We hope this strikes the right balance of predictability for new Stripe Atlas
users and getting the best support from the ecosystem for your new endeavors.

~~~
randompwd
You'd need to start with the main Atlas homepage :

> Receive discounts from our partners, including $5,000 in free credits from
> Amazon Web Services

[https://stripe.com/atlas](https://stripe.com/atlas)

~~~
patio11
Thanks; that is a regression. We'll fix it.

~~~
evolve2k
It now reads:

“ Grow and scale with free credits

Every dollar matters when you start your company. Sign up for discounts from
our partners, including Amazon Web Services, DigitalOcean, legal and
accounting firms, and more.”

------
Shank
> There's always an understanding with services like this that credit offers
> come with a lot of hand-waving and "caveat emptor"-ing: notice founders
> "have access to" free credits (emphasis ours), which could imply that some
> founders have the capacity to call on those funds, but not all. But still,
> the language does seem very direct and makes it easy to believe signing up
> includes $5,000 in AWS credits.

I'm not sure I understand the distinction between why they got $1k vs $5k. Is
there some clause in the contract that states that it's "up to $5k under
certain situations?" It seems like a lot of information is missing here.

~~~
nathanyz
This is unfortunately the case in many of these offers where the big banner
number is used to entice people in, but the actual amount given is much lower.
There is really no accountability to these types of over-promises as its not
really regulated like a sweepstakes or other free contest. And providing no
easy to understand rules keeps anyone from figuring out how to actually
receive the top amounts.

Not sure that is what's going on in this case, but without accountability or
penalties for bad behaviors this is likely to continue to be the case. No fine
print necessary.

------
Plough_Jogger
To save you the click:

> We have not received $5,000 in AWS credits. But now the good news: We have
> still received $1,000 in AWS credits.

------
nemothekid
Is the era of cloud credits over? It's been a while since I cared, but back in
the olden days I had GCP/AWS credits to the tune of $100,000.

~~~
DaiPlusPlus
MSDN Subscriptions still have them - but of course you’re still paying
thousands of USD/year for the subscription and the credits you get included
are a tiny fraction of that - and it’s not like it’s costing Microsoft
anything to provide that either.

~~~
freehunter
Microsoft has a solution they call Action Pack [1] where you pay ~$400/yr and
get $100 in Azure credits each month. So basically $400 gets you $1200 worth
of credits.

[1] [https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/membership/action-
pack](https://partner.microsoft.com/en-us/membership/action-pack)

------
eganist
There does not appear to be any fine print at least as seen on the only three
pages documenting the program at the time of my comment
([https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Astripe.com+"%245%2C00...](https://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Astripe.com+"%245%2C000+in+credits"+"atlas")):

•
[https://stripe.com/docs/atlas/details](https://stripe.com/docs/atlas/details)

• [https://stripe.com/docs/atlas/next](https://stripe.com/docs/atlas/next)

• [https://stripe.com/atlas](https://stripe.com/atlas)

I've archived the pages for the record:

• /details: [http://archive.vn/xRojd](http://archive.vn/xRojd) and
[https://web.archive.org/web/20200707231048/https://stripe.co...](https://web.archive.org/web/20200707231048/https://stripe.com/docs/atlas/details)

• /next: [http://archive.vn/5eyFp](http://archive.vn/5eyFp) and
[https://web.archive.org/web/20200605003821/https://stripe.co...](https://web.archive.org/web/20200605003821/https://stripe.com/docs/atlas/next)

• /atlas: [http://archive.vn/5m2s2](http://archive.vn/5m2s2) and
[https://web.archive.org/web/20200707231646/https://stripe.co...](https://web.archive.org/web/20200707231646/https://stripe.com/atlas)

CoreSet, you may be owed $4,000 in AWS credits from Stripe.

------
notatoad
I was assuming the $5k would be like a certain amount of credit towards S3, a
certain amount towards RDS, a certain amount towards load balancers, a certain
amount towards video transcoding, etc. so if you don't use video transcoding,
then you can't access the credit earmarked for that service.

but is it literally just a dollar amount that offsets your AWS bill, and you
get some variable amount? This post doesn't actually seem to include any
information about "what you actually get" other than to say you don't get $5k.

~~~
abiogenesis
It says that they got $1,000 instead of $5,000.

------
sergiomattei
I recently applied for the 5k too, got 1k. A bit misleading, but sure...
credits are credits.

~~~
gdulli
What's the fine print or reasoning that accounts for the difference between
what you're led to believe you'll get and what you actually get?

~~~
sergiomattei
Honestly, no idea. I didn't mind enough to check. Our costs are low.

------
teamspirit
That's strange, we got $10k in DO, and $20k in GCP. Both lasted 1 year. The
only one I really used was GCP, which expires for me in August.

I'm not sure if I regret it or not. I was able to learn a lot and work with
technologies I probably wouldn't have but for the credits, but now I'm stuck
trying to figure out how bring down our $500/mo spend a few months after we
already launched.

------
threshold
I used Atlas and got the full 5K from AWS last month. Digital Ocean denied me
any credit at all even after I followed all the many steps and sent
screenshots of the Atlas signups and all our sensitive company info. But I
don't think much of their service so whatever. I would suggest people avoid
going through the DO process, it's a scam to collect information on new
companies.

------
ruffrey
AWS Activate Founders Package offers $1,000 direct from Amazon.

[https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2020/02/aws-
launc...](https://aws.amazon.com/about-aws/whats-new/2020/02/aws-launches-
activate-founders-package/)

------
jstr
This is straight up false advertising in my opinion. You're paying for a
product that includes $5k in AWS credits but you're only receiving $1k in
credits.

------
ApolIllo
This article doesn't go beyond the title but I assume like any AWS funding you
have to show the ARR (Annual reoccurring revenue) potential for the future. I
know for a fact that they'll dish out $1m+ but it has to eventually lead to
revenue for them.

