# Running Costs — Estimating AI Automation ROI

Source: https://www.skillbyai.com/en/ai-automation-roi/c-run

> Tokens, services, infrastructure.

## Measure tokens per item

Running costs scale with volume: **model calls** (input and output tokens times price, times calls per item), other services such as OCR or document parsing, and **infrastructure** (hosting, queues, storage, logging, monitoring). Measure tokens per item in the pilot, include retries and long documents, and check provider prices and volume discounts. For many back-office automations, running costs are modest compared with labour; confirm it with your numbers.

## Monthly running cost, run

I ran this with plain Python 3. All figures belong to one worked example (an invoice-processing team) with invented but internally consistent numbers; prices are placeholders. Two model calls per invoice with 3,500 input and 400 output tokens each cost about $396 a month at placeholder prices; OCR adds $120 and infrastructure $400, for $916 a month or about $0.076 per invoice.

```python
volume = 12000
calls_per_item = 2                  # extraction + validation
tokens_in, tokens_out = 3500, 400   # per call, measured on samples
price_in, price_out = 3.00, 15.00   # $ per million tokens (placeholder)
llm = volume * calls_per_item * (tokens_in * price_in + tokens_out * price_out) / 1e6
ocr = volume * 0.01                 # document parsing service, $ per page (placeholder)
infra = 400                         # hosting, queue, logs, monitoring per month
print(f"LLM calls  ${llm:>8,.0f}/month")
print(f"OCR        ${ocr:>8,.0f}/month")
print(f"infra      ${infra:>8,.0f}/month")
print(f"total run  ${llm + ocr + infra:>8,.0f}/month  (${(llm + ocr + infra) / volume:.3f} per invoice)")
```

Output:

```
LLM calls  $     396/month
OCR        $     120/month
infra      $     400/month
total run  $     916/month  ($0.076 per invoice)
```

## Use pilot token counts

Real documents are longer and messier than samples; measure tokens on production-like data.

**Quiz:** How should model costs be estimated?

- [ ] They are always zero
- [ ] From a guess of one cent per month
- [ ] From the number of engineers
- [x] From measured tokens per item, calls per item and volume

*Answer:* From measured tokens per item, calls per item and volume. Measure and multiply.