---
title: "What Customers keep"
url: /lifecycle/continuity
---

# What Customers keep

> What Customers keep when a seller stops, leaves or cannot act: notice, service until the close, their records, held funds returned and receipts that verify.

Whatever ends a product, its Customers keep the same things: notice, service until the close, their records, their unspent money and receipts that still verify.

**What a Customer keeps, from the notice on.** The seller stops.

1. Notice: 30 days or more.
2. Served (until the close): every paid call.
3. Exported (self-serve): its Namespace.
4. Refunded (at the close): unspent and held.
5. Verified (for 7 years): every receipt.

Each step runs whether the seller acts or the platform acts for it.

## The floor no file lowers
Each line holds whatever the file says, so a Customer reads the same promise on every product.

| What a Customer keeps | For how long |
| --- | --- |
| Notice of the close | At least 30 days, or the rest of a signed commitment if longer |
| Every paid call served | Until the close; a sunset stops new sign-ups, never a paying Customer |
| Its records | Exported from the portal or by its API until the close and 30 days after |
| Unspent credits | Refunded to the card that paid them, at the close |
| Funds held for work not delivered | Returned in full: held funds are never paid out before delivery |
| A prepaid period | Refunded for the days after the close |
| Its receipts | Verifying against the seller's keys, kept listed for 7 years |

Refunds come from the seller's Stripe balance; held funds sit apart from it, so they are there to return.

## Four ways a product ends
The way differs; what a Customer keeps does not.

| The product | Who acts | What changes for a Customer |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Is [sunset](/lifecycle.md#end) by its seller | The seller, by `Product.sunset` | Nothing until the close, then the steps above |
| Is transferred | The two workspaces | Nothing: the same [Host](/reference/platform.md#host), [Keys](/reference/platform.md#key), prices and receipts |
| Leaves APIs.Dev | The seller, by `Product.export` | Nothing if the seller serves it elsewhere on the same Domain; else a sunset |
| Has a seller that cannot act | The platform, by a [wind-down](/lifecycle/continuity.md) | The steps above, run by the platform on the seller's behalf |

A seller cannot act when its workspace closes for cause, or when it stops answering for 30 days while its product owes work or money. A wind-down follows the seller's own published rules, with the shortest notice they allow.

## Ninety days of notice
The weekly brief gives its members 90 days' notice, three times the floor.

```ts title="definition.ts"
import { define, generative } from 'apis.dev'

/** A weekly brief on the software companies that changed headcount, for members and their agents. */
export default define({
  name: 'briefs', domain: 'briefs.apis.dev',
  sources: {
    firms: { api: 'companyfacts.apis.dev', cost: { 'Company.search': 0.005 } },
  },
  Issue: {
    week: 'string!#', title: 'string', body: 'markdown',
    status: {
      draft:   { run: generative('This week in {firms}: who hired, who shrank') },
      review:  { in: 'drafted', role: 'editor' },
      publish: { in: 'reviewed', role: 'editor' },
      send:    { in: 'published', to: 'Member' },
    },
  },
  on: { 'every Mon 06:00': 'Issue.draft', 'Issue.published': 'Issue.send' },
  offer: {
    'Issue.list': 0, 'Issue.read': 0.25,
    Member: { month: 8, includes: { 'Issue.read': 'all' } },
  },
  operate: { sunset: '90d' },
})
```

Each member's Watch receives the notice the day the sunset starts, with what it keeps.

```json title="Notice"
{
  "id": "evt_90",
  "type": "Product.sunsetting",
  "at": "2026-10-28T09:00:00Z",
  "data": {
    "closes": "2027-01-26",
    "export": "https://briefs.apis.dev/dashboard/export",
    "exportUntil": "2027-02-25",
    "refunds": { "credits": 3.75, "period": 4.27, "currency": "USD" },
    "receiptKeys": "https://briefs.apis.dev/.well-known/receipt-keys"
  }
}
```

A buyer's agent reads the same close date on the offer card, which says `sunsetting`, and its policy moves its mandates to another seller.

---

A product may end; what its Customers paid for, made and were promised does not end with it.