GoHighLevel SaaS Mode: how it works and what to charge clients

What SaaS Mode is

HighLevel's pricing page describes SaaS Mode as a way to turn the platform into "your own sellable software product": you set the price, sell subscriptions from your own website, and client accounts are created for you. In practice it bundles three things that the cheaper plans lack: a subscription builder (the SaaS Configurator), automatic account setup after payment, and the right to charge clients more than HighLevel charges you for usage.

White-labeling is related but separate. You can put the web app on your own domain on Unlimited or Agency Pro, and a white-label mobile app costs $497 a month extra. An agency can white-label on Unlimited and bill clients a flat retainer outside HighLevel. SaaS Mode matters when you want self-serve checkout, automatic onboarding, or usage billed back with a margin. For the full plan list, see our GoHighLevel pricing guide.

The SaaS Configurator

The SaaS Configurator is where you package HighLevel into plans. HighLevel's setup guide lists what each plan can hold:

• Pricing: monthly, annual or both, grouped into categories that set upgrade and downgrade paths.
• Features and snapshot: which tools the client sees, plus a snapshot applied automatically so the account arrives pre-built.
• Add-ons and Marketplace apps: optional paid extras the client can pick, and eligible third-party apps bundled in.
• Trial and credits: a trial length and complimentary credits for new sign-ups.
• Usage billing: rebilling rules and markup for phone, email and AI, set per plan.

You sell a plan through an order form in a funnel or with a direct checkout link copied from the configurator. When the payment clears, HighLevel creates the sub-account, applies the snapshot and starts the subscription as active or trialing. Existing clients can be moved onto a plan by hand, with a special price for that one client if you need to honor an older rate. If you want to vet sign-ups first, a security setting pauses new sub-accounts until you approve them.

Payment providers: SaaS V1 and V2

HighLevel runs two separate billing setups for SaaS Mode. You pick one when you turn it on, and a client account can only use one at a time, though both can run side by side in one agency.

Whichever you pick, HighLevel's rebilling guide lists a connected agency Stripe account as the prerequisite for rebilling and reselling usage, and every charge through that account carries Stripe's normal processing fees. Our cost math below assumes 2.9% plus 30 cents per charge.

Rebilling, markup and reselling

HighLevel always charges your agency wallet first for a client's texts, calls, email and AI. What happens next depends on your plan and settings:

Three details catch agencies out. First, rebilling only starts after the client adds a card, and HighLevel's own Stripe never charges your client: your Stripe account does, so failed payments and chargebacks land on you. Second, wallets pre-load and auto-recharge, and services pause if a wallet goes negative, which a client notices as texts that stop sending. Third, the Terms of Service forbid marking up any pass-through HighLevel fee unless you are on the $497 plan, so on Unlimited the rebilled amount must equal HighLevel's price. Set wallet usage alerts in agency billing so a runaway workflow does not surprise you or the client.

The fixed 5% on carrier and A2P fees

Some charges are pass-through costs from carriers: A2P registration and monthly campaign fees, SMS and MMS carrier fees, Verified Caller ID and RCS carrier fees. When rebilling is on, HighLevel adds a fixed 5% to these at the client account level, before your own multiplier. HighLevel's example: a $10.00 carrier fee becomes $10.50, and at a 2x multiplier the client pays $21.00. With rebilling off, nothing is added.

The amounts are small. On 500 texts a month at the $0.0042 carrier fee, the 5% adds about $0.11. It matters for invoices, not margins: a client comparing your bill line by line with HighLevel's rate card will see carrier fees 5% higher even on at-cost rebilling. Every carrier fee by network is listed in our LC Phone pricing guide.

Bundling AI Employee in a SaaS plan

Since July 29, 2026, you can attach an AI Employee plan to each SaaS plan: Growth at $50 a month per client (100 Voice AI minutes and 1,000 Conversation AI replies, then pay per use) or Unlimited at $97 (Conversation, Voice, Reviews and Content AI under fair use). Phone minutes are billed on top of both.

The alternative is to leave AI on pay per use and rebill it with a markup. On a standard voice at about $0.068 a minute, Unlimited only becomes cheaper than pay per use past roughly 1,426 Voice AI minutes a month per client. Bundle Unlimited in a premium plan for busy clients, and keep lighter clients on metered AI. The trade-offs are covered in our AI Employee Growth vs Unlimited guide and the per-call math in Voice AI pricing.

The minimum advertised price rule

Before you publish a price, read this clause from HighLevel's Terms of Service. If you white-label and resell the platform, you:

"may not digitally advertise access to any HighLevel package or plan for an effective price that is less than HighLevel's then-current standard pricing for the same or substantially similar package or plan"HighLevel Terms of Service, Minimum Advertised Price section

What that means in practice:

• It covers the core platform. Any offer that combines two or more of the funnel and website builder, forms, surveys, CRM, email builder, calendars or workflows counts, even if it is fully white-labeled and the buyer never hears the name HighLevel.
• The floor is $97. HighLevel's MAP FAQ (August 2024) says you may not advertise the core platform below $97, and a bundle that includes it must be advertised at or above $97 too.
• It limits advertised prices, not what you finally charge. A lower price in a private quote, a private email or a cart that shows the price only after "add to cart" is allowed, as long as search engines and the public cannot see it.
• No lifetime deals. Core platform access must be billed on a recurring basis unless HighLevel approves otherwise in writing.

A single standalone feature, such as only a booking calendar, is outside the rule. This is our reading of HighLevel's policy, not legal advice; the full text is in the Terms of Service.

What to charge clients: build from costs, not rumors

Price ranges quoted online rarely show the costs behind them. Here are three client packages priced from HighLevel's published rates. They are illustrations to show the method, not advice and not a prediction of income.

Assumptions: 10 clients on Agency Pro, so the plan costs $49.70 per client. Each client has one local number, one A2P campaign at the lowest monthly fee, 500 texts, 3,000 emails, 150 minutes of staff calls in and 100 out. AI calls use a standard voice with GPT-4.1 Mini, and phone minutes round up per call. The fee is the lowest monthly price that leaves a 60% margin after Stripe fees of 2.9% plus 30 cents, with all usage absorbed in the fee.

Two things stand out. The plan fee is the biggest cost for a software-only client at this scale ($49.70 of $63.62), so each extra client you sign lowers everyone's cost. And bundling AI Employee Unlimited more than doubles the cost per client, which is why it belongs in a higher-priced plan rather than a base one.

For comparison, one third-party guide describes $197 to $297 a month per client as a common resale band (Ecosire, June 2026), and a Webdew SaaS Mode walkthrough (June 2026) uses $297 as its worked example. We found no survey behind those figures. On our numbers, that band covers software only and a light AI receptionist with room for your time, but not a bundled AI Employee Unlimited at a 60% margin.

Your fee also has to pay for onboarding, support calls and the clients who cancel. Run your own client list in the calculator's Price a client tab, preloaded with the AI receptionist package. It also models rebilling usage with a markup, so its suggested fee is lower than ours when usage is billed separately.

Price a SaaS client Try HighLevel

When Agency Pro pays for itself

Agency Pro costs $200 a month more than Unlimited. If markup on usage were your only reason to upgrade, the upgrade pays off once markup income covers that $200. The table shows how many clients that takes, after card fees on the marked-up amount, using the usage from the packages above ($13.92 a month for software only, $54.91 with the AI receptionist).

Light clients barely move the needle: markup on a software-only client's texts and emails is worth $3.48 to $13.92 a month at these markups. AI usage changes the picture, because Unlimited cannot rebill AI at all. Markup is rarely the only reason to upgrade, though. Self-serve checkout, automatic account creation, AI Employee rebilling, agent reporting and advanced API access are all Agency Pro features, and the upgrade is prorated, so you can move up the month those start to matter.

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