HP Tuners credits, and why they are billed separately

HP Tuners is the platform used to read and write factory engine control units on most of what comes through here, GM in particular. Licensing works on credits, and credits are what allow the software to write to a specific vehicle.

A credit licenses the interface to write to one controller in one vehicle. Once a vehicle is licensed, that licence stays with it, so further changes to the same car do not consume more. The cost is front loaded onto the first visit and does not recur every time you come back for a revision.

This matters if you intend to change the car over time. The licence you pay for on the first session is still valid when you come back after fitting a camshaft.

Most vehicles need somewhere between 2 to 20 credits, and the count depends on the vehicle rather than on what you are asking for. Some cars have one controller to license. Others have the engine controller and the transmission controller as separate items, and both have to be licensed if both are being changed.

Newer platforms with locked or protected controllers can need more. None of that is a judgement about the work involved: it is what the platform charges to write to that particular vehicle.

Custom tuning is $250 an hour and dyno time is included in that. Credits are not, and folding them in would mean one of two things: either every customer subsidises the cars that need more credits, or the rate goes up for everybody to cover the worst case.

Passing them through at cost is the honest version. You pay for what your vehicle actually requires, you can see what it was, and the labour rate stays the same regardless of what platform you turn up in.

The licence is attached to the vehicle. If you later want to work on the car yourself, or take it elsewhere, that is a conversation worth having at the time rather than an assumption in either direction.

What you definitely leave with is the measured result of the work: the run sheets, the before and after overlay, and a straight account of what changed. The custom tuning page covers what a calibration session involves.