The tier upgrade is not working for many users. I have several users of my software that added money to their account (e.g., $50) and are stuck on the Free tier. It makes no sense.
Also, after searching the forum here, it seems many other users are having this issue too. Here are some relevant threads:
I have found a workaround, just use Playground, increase your max tokes to max and write: Write 10 blog post with 2000 word about gardening. Use it until you spent 5$ then you will be automatically transferred to tier 1.
This suggestion didn’t work for me.
Yesterday I’ve done this for one of my friend and it worked perfectly. So it must be something that you did wrong. Playground on OpenAI uses API, just select the most expensive model and run it until you spent 5$.
Look at the other threads in the forum, it’s a well-known issue. Glad that it worked for your friend, for me spending > 5USD didn’t work.
