What AI chat actually costs
The sticker price is rarely the price. Here is how the common models behave once you are actually using them.
Three models dominate, and they fail differently as you grow.
Per seat
Cheap while one person runs the chat, awkward the moment you want a second pair of eyes on it. It prices the wrong thing: your team size, not your traffic.
Per conversation
Honest until a good month arrives and your bill scales with your busiest week. Watch what counts as a conversation — a returning visitor is often a new one.
Per resolution
Sounds fairest and is the hardest to audit: the vendor decides what counted as resolved. Ask to see exactly how that is measured before you agree to it.
The costs that are not on the pricing page
- Setup or onboarding fees, often the largest line in year one
- Channels sold separately — WhatsApp is usually its own price
- Feature tiers that put handoff or analytics above your plan
- The hours your team spends maintaining answer content
Work out your own cost per conversation
Take what you pay, divide by the conversations you actually had last month, and compare it to what one of those conversations is worth. For most shops the number that matters is not the monthly fee — it is whether two extra orders a month covers it.
Watch for the upgrade cliff
Tiered pricing usually puts one thing you will definitely need — handoff, transcripts, a second channel, removing the vendor's badge — one tier above where you start. Find that thing before you sign, because it is the real price.
Flat pricing, and its trade-off
A single flat price is easy to plan around, and it means the vendor is not paid more when the assistant fails to resolve something. The honest trade-off is that a very small shop subsidises a very busy one — fine, if the number is small enough not to matter.
Work out your own cost per conversation
Take what you pay, divide by the conversations you actually had last month, and compare it to what one of those is worth. For most shops the number that matters is not the monthly fee — it is whether two extra orders a month covers it.
Watch for the upgrade cliff
Tiered pricing usually puts one thing you will definitely need — handoff, transcripts, a second channel, removing the vendor badge — one tier above where you start. Find that thing before you sign, because it is the real price.
Flat pricing, and its trade-off
A single flat price is easy to plan around, and it means the vendor is not paid more when the assistant fails to resolve something. The honest trade-off is that a very small shop subsidises a very busy one — fine, if the number is small enough not to matter.