Short answer
Oraculo bills an AI employee by the hour of work: $12 an hour on Starter with a 6-hour weekly minimum (about $312 a month), or $8 an hour on Business with a 43-hour weekly minimum (about $1,500 a month). A published task-time chart sets how many hours each task counts as, so you pay for work done.
Why price an AI employee by the hour at all
Most AI products charge per seat, per message, per token or per 'credit.' None of those map to how a business owner thinks about help. An owner asks: how much would this cost me per hour of useful work, compared with a person doing the same thing?
Hourly pricing answers that directly. If sending 40 follow-up texts counts as a certain amount of work time, you can compare it with what that same work costs from an employee, a virtual assistant or an agency. It also means you are not billed for how long a computer happened to take, only for the work product.
This page explains how the hourly model works at Oraculo, a managed AI employee, so you can estimate your own bill before you talk to anyone.
The numbers, in one table
| Plan | Rate | Weekly minimum | About per month | Includes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | $12 per hour of work | 6 hours | $312 | The full AI employee, all channels |
| Business | $8 per hour of work | 43 hours | $1,500 | Dedicated Slack account manager; built-in CRM add-on is $50 a month |
| Enterprise | Custom, or 30% of what it saves you | Custom | Custom | Scoped with you |
Separate from the hourly rate: setup is a one-time $499 and includes four 1-hour Zoom sessions with an engineer who connects your tools with you. Phone calls are $0.19 a minute. Billing is monthly, unlimited locations are included, you get 3 free billing disputes a month, and there is a 30-day money-back guarantee.
The arithmetic: 6 hours a week over a month is roughly 26 hours, and 26 times $12 is $312. The Business minimum of 43 hours a week at $8 comes to about $1,500 a month.
The task-time chart: how work becomes hours
Each type of task has a set time value on a published chart. That is the unit your bill is built from. The point is predictability: the same task counts the same amount every time, regardless of whether the AI happened to finish quickly or slowly.
- You can estimate ahead. Count roughly how many of each task type you expect in a week and multiply by the chart's value.
- You are not billed for compute. Processing time, retries and background checking are not what you pay for.
- Disputes have a path. If an entry looks wrong, you can raise it, and three disputes a month are free.
If a task is not on the chart, ask for its value before you delegate it. That is a fair question to put to any vendor that bills by task.
What the weekly minimum means
The minimum is a floor, not a cap. On Starter, you commit to at least 6 hours of work a week, which keeps the price at about $312 a month if you use it lightly. If you delegate more, additional hours are billed at the same $12 rate.
A practical way to think about it: 6 hours a week is a good fit for a one-person business or one owner with a handful of recurring jobs, such as lead follow-up, scheduling and inbox triage. The 43-hour minimum on Business suits a team that wants the employee supervising people, running reports and answering a busy line. Compare that to a full-time person's roughly 40 hours.
For one-person businesses, see AI employee for a one-person business. For a total-cost view against hiring, see how much does an AI employee cost.
Three worked examples (illustrative)
| Business | Typical weekly work | Likely plan | Monthly bill, roughly |
|---|---|---|---|
| Solo consultant | Calendar, inbox triage, lead follow-up, weekly report | Starter at the minimum | $312, plus calls at $0.19 per minute |
| Two-truck service company | Answering calls, booking, quote follow-up, reminders | Starter, above the minimum | $312 plus any extra hours at $12, plus calls |
| Ten-person office with a busy phone line and team accountability | Front desk, follow-up, KPI reports, team nudges | Business | About $1,500, plus calls and the $50 CRM add-on if you want it |
These are examples of how to reason, not quotes. Real usage depends on your task mix, and the demo is where you get a number for your business. An estimate for a phone-heavy business: 500 minutes of calls in a month is 500 times $0.19, or $95, on top of the hourly work.
Hourly vs the alternatives
A person is paid for hours present, including idle ones, and also costs taxes, benefits, software and management time. Oraculo's estimate for a typical five-person business is that the stack of tools and roles it replaces adds up to about $17,410 a month (CRM, website, marketing agency, receptionist, back office, office manager, virtual assistant, social media manager, answering service and miscellaneous). That is the site's own estimate, not a guarantee, and your stack will differ.
More direct comparisons: AI employee vs hiring a receptionist, AI employee vs virtual assistant cost and AI employee vs answering service cost.
What the hourly price does not buy
- Judgment. It does the work you delegate; you still make decisions and approve important actions.
- A guarantee of results. A reply in minutes helps, but it does not make every lead buy.
- Other vendors' fees. Your CRM, payment processor or ad spend are separate unless you retire them.
To see what your own task mix would cost, book a 20-minute demo. You can also see pricing on the home page.
Key takeaway
Hourly pricing makes an AI employee comparable to a person: a published rate, a published task-time chart and a weekly minimum. Estimate your task mix first, then check it in a demo.
Frequently asked questions
How much does an AI employee cost per hour?
Oraculo's Starter plan is $12 per hour of work with a 6-hour weekly minimum, about $312 a month. Business is $8 per hour with a 43-hour weekly minimum, about $1,500 a month. Enterprise is custom, or 30% of what it saves you.
What counts as an hour of work?
Each task type has a set time value on a published task-time chart. Your bill is the sum of those values, so you pay for work done rather than how long a computer took. Ask for the value of any task not on the chart.
Is there a minimum commitment?
There are weekly minimums: 6 hours on Starter and 43 hours on Business. Billing is monthly, and there is a 30-day money-back guarantee if the first month does not fit.
What else do I pay besides the hourly rate?
A one-time $499 setup that includes four 1-hour Zoom sessions with an engineer, and $0.19 per minute for phone calls. The built-in CRM is a $50 monthly add-on on Business.
What if I disagree with a charge?
You get 3 free billing disputes per month. Because pricing follows a published task-time chart, a disputed entry can be checked against the chart.