What an AI employee costs
Nobody can tell you what an AI employee costs without knowing how it is priced, because the models behind the figures behave completely differently once the work is uneven. This page is the four models, what each one bills you for, and what each one costs in a month when not much happens.
Concretely
- Starts at $0: you get $120 of credit on signup and no card is asked for.
- Credits are bought in packs from $20, once, when you want them.
- Nothing recurs, so there is no monthly figure to forecast and nothing to cancel.
- Credit never expires, so a quiet month costs nothing and the balance is still there.
- Priced on the work done rather than per seat, so the whole team can use it.
- Giving it more jobs costs nothing extra, because jobs are not what is billed.
| Pricing model | What you are billed for | What it costs in a quiet month |
|---|---|---|
| Per seat | What you are billed forEach person who has access, whether or not they used it. | What it costs in a quiet monthThe same as a busy month. Seats do not know how much work happened. |
| Per agent or per job | What you are billed forEach configured agent, bot or role you keep switched on. | What it costs in a quiet monthThe same as a busy month, and it rises every time you give it something new to do. |
| Monthly subscription with a usage allowance | What you are billed forA fixed floor, plus overage once you pass the allowance. | What it costs in a quiet monthThe floor, in full. Unused allowance usually does not roll over. |
| Prepaid credit, drawn down by work done | What you are billed forThe work actually performed, whenever it is performed. | What it costs in a quiet monthNothing. The balance is still there when the work picks up. |
The question is not the price, it is what the price is attached to
Two products can quote the same figure and cost you very different amounts, because one is charging for people who have access and the other is charging for work that got done. That distinction decides your bill far more than the headline number does, and it is the thing almost every pricing page leaves you to work out. A team of nine where two people use it daily pays for nine under one model and for the work of two under another.
A quiet month is where the models separate
Work is not evenly spread. Some months the inbox is heavy and every lead needs three follow-ups, and some months very little happens. Under a seat fee or a per-agent fee those two months cost the same, which means you are paying a subscription for capacity you did not use. Under prepaid credit the quiet month costs nothing at all, and nothing has been lost, because the balance does not expire.
Setup is a cost even when it is not a line item
The other half of what this costs is the time it takes before anything works. A platform where you build the agent yourself is cheaper per month and more expensive in the weeks where somebody has to build it. That time is real whether or not anyone invoices you for it, and it belongs in the comparison alongside the monthly figure.
What ours is
You start with $120 of credit and no card. When it runs out you buy a pack from $20, once, and buy another when you want one. Nothing recurs, nothing expires, and there is no seat fee, so what you spend follows what Sanaf did rather than how many people have it open. If you would rather we set the whole thing up and run it, that is quoted in writing against the role.
How to work out your own figure
Start free and give it a real job for a week. That is the only estimate worth having, because the work your business generates is not the work anybody else's does, and every figure on a pricing page is somebody guessing at your volume. At the end of the week you will have spent nothing and you will know what a week costs.
The jobs this comes from
Sanaf holds thirty five written job descriptions. These are the ones behind this page.