Glossary
Per-minute pricing and flat rates
With per-minute pricing you pay for every minute of a call, with a package you pay a fixed monthly fee with included minutes; a true flat rate without a volume limit is rare in AI telephony.
There are three models on the market. Usage-based: no base fee, every minute is charged. Package: a monthly price includes a fixed number of minutes, and further minutes cost extra. Individual: the price is set in a contract, mostly for large volumes.
When comparing, what matters is what the per-minute price contains. Some providers state only a platform fee and charge language model, voice and telephony separately. Others put everything into one price. Possible costs for phone numbers, concurrent calls and setup come on top. It only becomes comparable once you work out the monthly total for your own call volume: base price plus additional minutes plus extras.
In practice
For the calculation you need two numbers from your own business: how many calls a month the assistant is to take and how long a call lasts on average. That gives you the minutes. Work through three months, a quiet one, a normal one and a busy one, and compare the totals for each pricing model. Packages are predictable but only pay off if you roughly use up the included minutes. Pure per-minute prices are cheap with few calls and can surprise you in a busy month. Also ask whether billing is per second or per started minute.
An example
A locksmith has few calls in summer and many in winter. The owner compares an offer without a base fee with a package of fixed included minutes. In the quiet months billing per minute would cost less, in the busy ones the package would. He adds up the whole year and finds the difference smaller than expected. What tips the balance is that telephony and voice are included in the package, while with the other offer he would have to add up three items.
A common misunderstanding
The lowest price per minute is rarely the lowest total. Many comparisons fail because one price covers only the platform and another all components. Just as widespread is the expectation of a flat rate like that of a mobile contract. Every minute of conversation causes computing costs for the provider. With plans advertised as unlimited it is therefore worth reading the terms: they state what happens at particularly high usage.
At Call0
Call0 sells packages: Launch costs €110 per month with 700 minutes, and each additional minute costs €0.16.
Related terms:
On this topic:
As of: 12 October 2026