The AI bill does not tell you what one completed business request costs. Start with the unit your business actually delivers.

A token-only comparison can leave out retries, discarded drafts, failed attempts, and the human review needed to finish the work.

Trace the complete request path and include unsuccessful work in the cost of requests that do reach a valid completion.

Show human effort, allocated fixed costs, and marginal costs separately. Keep assumptions visible so reviewers can compare options fairly.

Agree on a stop or revision rule before expanding. Cost per completed request is more useful than a cheap-looking model invocation.

Original article explainer. AI-assisted conceptual illustration and neural narration; original synthesized music. Not a human recording or customer result.