What is your firm actually spending on AI?
Most firms cannot answer that question in one number. The subscriptions are on four different cards, the token bills are buried in a developer’s account, and the largest cost, the hours your people spend keeping it all working, never appears on an invoice at all. This workbook adds it up.
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- One first-year total, built from four categories you fill in
- Cost per person and cost per matter, calculated for you
- A column for who decided to buy each tool, often the most revealing one
- Five questions to ask once you have the number
Works in Excel or Google Sheets. About 20 minutes if you have the invoices handy. Formulas are already written: you enter counts and rates, the workbook does the arithmetic.
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Download the calculator (.xlsx)The download didn’t start automatically? Use the button above. Open it in Excel or Google Sheets and begin on the “Start Here” tab.
Why this exists
The invoice is never the whole cost
When a firm asks what AI is costing them, they usually name the subscriptions, because those are the costs that arrive as a bill with a number on it. The workbook asks about four categories, and the last one is almost always the largest.
- SubscriptionsPer-seat tools, including the ones bought on someone’s personal card and never reported.
- API and tokensUsage-metered spend, priced differently for input and output, on rates that change without notice.
- Builds and vendorsWhat you paid an outside developer or consultant to make something work once.
- Internal timeThe hours your own people spend fixing prompts, re-running failed jobs, and re-explaining the tool. Never invoiced, rarely counted, usually the biggest line in the workbook.
That last line is why the total matters. If most of your AI cost is people keeping tools useful, the answer is not a cheaper tool. It is a decision nobody has made yet about how the work should flow.
Inside the workbook
Six tabs, formulas already written
You enter counts and rates. Every total, percentage, and per-person figure calculates itself.
Start Here
How to use the workbook, plus a live summary that totals your first-year AI cost as you fill the other tabs in.
Subscriptions
Every per-seat tool, with seats and cost per seat. Includes a column for who decided to buy it.
API & Tokens
Usage-metered spend, with input and output token rates priced separately and runs per month.
Build & People
One-time builds, ongoing maintenance, and the internal hours nobody invoices, at your blended rate.
Total Cost
The roll-up: monthly, first-year, share of total by category, and cost per person and per matter.
What This Tells You
Five questions to ask once you have the number, starting with how many different people decided to buy something.
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