An assessment quote that bills invitations and one that bills completed sessions can look similar until people abandon an attempt, repeat it or take a second exercise. The price is only meaningful after you know which event creates a charge.
Build the budget in two parts: external cash outlay and internal effort. Use the same workflow and period for every quote, retain unknown terms as unknowns, and calculate a quiet period as well as a hiring burst. The worksheet below includes fictional prices so you can see the arithmetic without mistaking it for a current vendor offer.
Define the unit before comparing the price
Write down the vendor's billing definition verbatim beside the quote date. "Assessment," "candidate" and "credit" are not sufficiently precise units on their own.
Ask whether a charge starts when an invitation is sent, a session begins or a report is completed. Then ask what happens when the same person returns. A technical rerun, a second modality and a new attempt after coaching may have different rules. Reviewer seats can create a separate charge even when participant usage is included.
If you are still choosing the type of product, start with the software category guide. This worksheet compares commercial terms for a defined workflow; it does not decide which assessment evidence your hiring team needs.
Use a dated written quote for each rule. A phrase such as "unlimited assessments" still needs a definition of included activities, users and any conditions. Do not fill those gaps with remembered website copy.
Map people, attempts and reviews separately
One applicant might receive an invitation, complete a chat exercise, repeat it after a technical interruption and later take a voice exercise. That remains one person, but it may create several chargeable events and several reviews.
Choose the task's assessment mode before budgeting extra attempts. Do not include video merely because a plan contains it. Likewise, keep internal onboarding practice separate from hiring usage unless the quote explicitly covers both.
Copy this input sheet for each vendor and period. The example columns describe alternative fictional months, not successive months that must be added together.
| Input | Quiet month | Hiring-burst month |
|---|---|---|
| Period and currency | One modeled month, USD | One modeled month, USD |
| Unique people invited | 40 | 200 |
| People completing an initial session | 24 | 150 |
| Additional completed retakes | 2 | 10 |
| Additional completed second-mode sessions | 4 | 20 |
| Total completed sessions | 30 | 180 |
| Unique people reviewed | 24 | 150 |
| Reviewer hours, all attempts included | 8 | 40 |
| Support hours, excluding review | 2 | 6 |
| Loaded reviewer hourly cost | $70 | $70 |
| Loaded support hourly cost | $40 | $40 |
The time and rates are illustrative assumptions, not market benchmarks. Reviewer hours already include the work on retakes and extra-mode sessions; do not add that effort again elsewhere. Support hours cover administration and troubleshooting only.
Identify who actually performs the reviews. CIPD's selection guidance advises deciding who has access to test results. That is a reason to name the review owner, not evidence for any price or time estimate. In a Miki workflow, private reports and scores are for managers/admins, not candidates.
Keep the formula visible
For a confirmed allowance-and-overage model, use:
Chargeable excess units = max(0, billable units - included units)
Cash subtotal = subscription + chargeable excess units × overage unit price + setup
Internal labor = reviewer hours × loaded reviewer hourly cost
+ support hours × loaded support hourly cost
Period cost = cash subtotal + internal labor
Pure usage billing has no included allowance: multiply the billable units by the unit price, then add any separately quoted fixed charges. Apply minimum commitments, tiered rates and other charge rules separately as written in the quote. The simple formula is not a substitute for those terms.
Training fees, taxes and optional services also need explicit rows. If a fee is unknown, the result is a subtotal with an unresolved item, not a complete price. Do not treat salaried employee time as a cash saving; the labor line values capacity consumed without claiming payroll will change.
Compare two fictional quotes
Assume both options provide the same required workflow solely for this illustration. Actual proposals must be checked for scope before comparing their totals.
- Quote A charges $300 for a month including 50 invitations, then $8 per extra invitation. In this fictional offer, retakes and extra-mode attempts do not create new invitation charges.
- Quote B charges $14 per completed session, including retakes and second-mode sessions, with no subscription, allowance or minimum commitment.
- Each has a $100 setup charge in the modeled initial month. There is no separate training fee in these fictional terms. Taxes are excluded and must be confirmed for a real purchase.
| Calculated item | Quiet month | Hiring-burst month |
|---|---|---|
| A: excess invitations | 0 | 150 |
| A: cash subtotal including setup | $400 | $1,600 |
| B: billable completed sessions | 30 | 180 |
| B: cash subtotal including setup | $520 | $2,620 |
| Internal labor, either option | $640 | $3,040 |
| A: cash plus valued labor | $1,040 | $4,640 |
| B: cash plus valued labor | $1,160 | $5,660 |
For the burst month, Quote A's cash calculation is $300 + 150 × $8 + $100 = $1,600. Labor is 40 × $70 + 6 × $40 = $3,040. The combined modeled cost is $4,640 before taxes or any unresolved charges.
Quote A has the lower modeled total under these assumptions. That does not establish that invitation billing is generally cheaper. The comparison changes with the completion pattern, the included allowance, the required modes or a minimum commitment. Unused allowance is already paid for in the subscription; it is not a future credit unless the terms say it rolls over.
Suppose Quote B's technical-retake rule has not been confirmed. In the burst case, excluding the ten retakes produces 170 billable sessions and a $2,480 cash subtotal. Including them produces $2,620. Keep the range $2,480–$2,620, plus excluded taxes, until the vendor resolves the rule. Entering zero for the unknown charge would hide the buying question.
Use the denominator that matches the decision
For Quote A's quiet month, the $400 cash subtotal equals $10 per invited person, $13.33 per completed session or $16.67 per reviewed person, rounded to cents. Those are different measures of the same cost. Label which one you use and keep the denominator tied to the same period.
The completed-session denominator includes retakes and extra-mode attempts. It should not be called cost per candidate. The reviewed-person denominator excludes people whose evidence nobody has reviewed yet.
Cost per hire requires additional information about the wider hiring process, including later interviews, offers and accepted starts. Do not divide by an assumed hiring rate and present the result as observed software economics. This worksheet deliberately stops short of bad-hire savings or ROI forecasts.
Ask for a quote that can be reconciled
Send the vendor the activity table and a request such as:
Please quote the stated hiring workflow for the same period and currency. Confirm the billing event, included units, treatment of abandoned attempts, technical retakes and second-mode sessions, review-user charges, setup and training fees, taxes, minimum commitments, renewal terms and unused-unit rules. Identify any activity in the table that is outside the quoted scope.
Save the reply with the calculation inputs. If a term changes, revise the affected line rather than replacing the whole comparison with a new headline price.
For Miki, inspect the chat assessment workflow to identify the conversation and manager-review activities your model needs. Obtain current written commercial terms separately. Take the completed input table into the commercial discussion so both sides can resolve the remaining billing questions against the same workflow.