Customers can also sign a long-term contract and spread the initial fee, plus the annual fees, over the term of the contract.
Over the years, the Democrats have tended to build their advertising teams around a few highly paid stars whose focus is politics, while the Republicans often spread their fees among a broad mix of political consultants and ad executives from Madison Avenue.
And surely once the BBC commits "to spread the licence fee more equitably", it is only a matter of time before Yorkshire, say, which has a population roughly the size of Scotland's, demands its share.
Rather than recording the entire purchase when it was made, the club will spread the transfer fee over the length of the player's contract.
Cash-strapped Everton might balk at Manchester United's intention to spread the transfer fee over the course of the player's five-year contract, no doubt preferring to have the cash up front.
One is that in a union of companies as connected as NYSE Euronext and ICE, it's not uncommon to spread the fees and deal credit around to longtime advisers, even if the core group is much smaller.
And as word of his travelling menagerie spread, his fees increased.
The BBC has argued that spreading licence fee funding around would do little for plurality.
At that time, the company tried to retroactively spread the card fees it received from customers over 12 months rather than when they were received.
Nobody drew attention to the fact that with each new instrument the finance sector took a cut in the form of a fee, or the spread between buying and selling prices.
