Observed Signal · Aug 12, 2026 · Technical Analysis · Source: DEV Community · Impact: 2/5 · Sentiment: Positive
AI agent cost test: 1,200 calls cost $1.20
The author ran a self‑hosted n8n support agent 100 times over the same 12‑ticket inbox (1,200 model calls) to measure real inference cost. All model calls were sent to meta-llama/llama-4-scout through fal, which bills a flat $0.001 per request, producing a $1.20 total bill. The experiment found high decision consistency (98 of 100 runs identical: 9 answered, 3 escalated) and highlighted operational caveats: build and integration effort, token‑sensitive providers increasing cost for longer conversations, and an initial n8n default 300s timeout that stopped the first run (fixed via N8N_RUNNERS_TASK_TIMEOUT). The author published the workflow and receipts on GitHub and a video on the Ships Itself channel.
Provides practical, measurable insight into real inference costs and operational caveats for deploying LLM-based support agents — useful for budgeting and design decisions but not industry‑shifting.
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Key Takeaways & Evidence Grounding
- The test ran 100 sequential runs of a 12-ticket inbox in self-hosted n8n, totaling 1,200 model calls.
- All model calls went to meta-llama/llama-4-scout via fal; fal's public flat rate is $0.001 per request, yielding a $1.20 total bill.
- Consistency: 98 of 100 runs returned identical decisions (9 tickets answered, 3 escalated); 2 runs escalated one additional ticket.
- Intercom's Fin publicly charges $0.99 per resolution; the raw model inference cost per resolution in this test was about $0.001.
- Operational issues observed: n8n's default 300s task timeout caused the first run to fail and was resolved by setting N8N_RUNNERS_TASK_TIMEOUT.
Connected Companies & Entities
5 Entities mapped“The agent is three code nodes in self-hosted n8n:...”
“Every model call goes to `meta-llama/llama-4-scout` through fal, which bills a flat rate per request, and every response carries an `x-fal-b...”
“For comparison, Intercom's Fin — the market leader — charges **$0.99 per resolution** (their public price)....”
“The whole workflow, the demo tickets, and the run receipts are here: 👉 **https://github.com/Ships-Itself/builds/tree/main/ep05-cost-teard...”
“If that's your thing, the video version of this teardown is on the [Ships Itself](https://youtube.com/@shipsitself) channel....”
Ontology Mapping & Concepts
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