Wallet, Sparks, and Credits: What Pay-as-You-Go AI Actually Costs
Most salon software that includes AI buries the cost inside a higher subscription tier. You pay for it every month whether you use it or not. If you only need it occasionally, you're subsidising features that don't earn their keep.
OpenChair works differently. Sparks are AI credits that power every AI action in the platform — and on the Pro plan, you get a generous allocation included each month. Your Wallet holds a prepaid balance that covers any usage beyond your included Sparks, plus SMS and email overages. Nothing is billed retroactively. No surprise invoices at the end of the month.
Here's how it all works, what each action actually costs, and how to decide whether the numbers make sense for your venue.
What Is the Wallet, Exactly?
Your Wallet is a prepaid balance that sits inside your OpenChair account. You load it in advance, and it draws down when you use AI features beyond your included Sparks or send messages beyond your plan's SMS and email allowance.
This matters because it separates your core subscription cost from your variable usage. Your monthly plan covers your seat licences, core features, and a pool of included Sparks. The Wallet covers anything extra you choose to use. You stay in control of both.
The minimum top-up is $10. Your balance never expires — load it up and spend it at your own pace. You can also set up automatic top-ups so your Wallet reloads when it drops below a threshold you choose.
What Are Sparks?
Sparks are the unit of AI credit inside OpenChair. One Spark costs one cent. Every AI action in the platform sits in one of four clear pricing tiers, so you always know what you're spending before you spend it.
Pro venues receive 500 Sparks per active team member each month, pooled across the venue, up to a maximum of 5,000 Sparks. A solo Pro operator gets 500 Sparks ($5 of AI credit) included. A four-stylist Pro venue gets 2,000 Sparks ($20 of AI credit). A ten-seat operation hits the cap at 5,000 Sparks ($50 of AI credit).
Included Sparks don't expire. If you don't use them all this month, they carry forward. The system always draws from your included balance first — your Wallet is only touched once included Sparks are exhausted.
The pooling matters for multi-seat venues. If one stylist uses AI heavily and another barely touches it, the credits balance across the team automatically. No per-person limits, no wasted allocation.
On the Free tier, there are no included Sparks. Every AI action draws directly from your Wallet at the same one-cent-per-Spark rate. That suits operators who want to test AI features without committing to Pro.
What Does Each Action Cost?
Every AI action in OpenChair falls into one of four pricing tiers:
Light Generation — 1 Spark ($0.01)
The everyday AI actions. Quick, low-cost, and designed to be used freely:
- Smart replies — AI-suggested responses in your inbox
- Service descriptions — generate or polish descriptions for your service menu
- Campaign copy — draft SMS or email marketing content
- Client briefs — summarise a client's history and preferences before their appointment
- Note polishing — clean up appointment notes
- Brand voice suggestions — tone and style recommendations for your venue's messaging
Concierge Outbound — 2 Sparks ($0.02)
Messages sent by the AI Concierge on your behalf:
- Booking confirmations — automated confirmation messages to clients
- Follow-up messages — post-appointment check-ins
- Appointment reminders — proactive nudges via the Concierge
Heavy Orchestration — 10 Sparks ($0.10)
Complex AI tasks that involve multiple steps or deeper analysis:
- Service recommendations — AI-powered suggestions for client upsells
- Photo validation — checking uploaded images meet quality standards
- Business health reports — AI-generated narrative analysis of your venue's performance
- Client insight narratives — detailed AI breakdowns of client trends and behaviour
Image Generation — 25 Sparks ($0.25)
The most resource-intensive AI action:
- Style Preview — AI-generated hairstyle visualisations that show clients how a new look would suit them
The platform shows you the exact Spark cost before you confirm any AI action. No guesswork.
What About SMS and Email?
Pro venues also get included SMS and email allocations that scale with your team:
SMS (AU and GB only): 100 messages base, plus 50 per additional team member, up to a maximum of 550 per month. A three-person team gets 200 SMS included. Overages are charged to your Wallet — 6 cents per SMS in Australia, 4 pence in the UK.
Email: 1,000 per team member, up to a maximum of 10,000 per month. A five-person team gets 5,000 emails included. Email overages are a fraction of a cent each.
When you go over your included amounts, the Wallet tracks overages down to fractions of a cent. It only debits whole cents, so sub-cent costs accumulate until they cross that threshold. You're never overpaying.
On the Free tier, SMS and email are available on a pay-as-you-go basis from your Wallet.
How Does This Compare to Bundled AI Pricing?
The main alternative in the market is AI bundled into a premium subscription tier. You pay a higher monthly fee, and AI features are included whether you use them or not.
For a solo operator who generates a few campaign drafts and uses smart replies each month, the maths is clear. Those actions cost 1 Spark each — a few cents total. If a competitor charges an extra $40 per month for an AI tier, and you're using it for the same lightweight tasks, you're massively overpaying.
The bundled model is also opaque. You're paying for a package, not a price list. You don't know what each action costs because the pricing isn't broken down. That makes it difficult to evaluate ROI on any individual feature.
Sparks give you a line-item view of your AI spend. You can see exactly which actions consumed credits, when, and whether the outcome justified the cost.
Doing the Maths on Common Scenarios
A solo operator using AI for everyday tasks: 50 smart replies (50 Sparks) + 4 campaign drafts (4 Sparks) + 2 client briefs (2 Sparks) = 56 Sparks per month. That's $0.56 — well inside the 500 included Sparks on Pro. Wallet untouched.
A three-stylist salon using AI Concierge after hours: The Concierge sends around 60 outbound messages per month (120 Sparks) and handles 5 complex booking decisions (50 Sparks). Add 30 smart replies (30 Sparks) and 4 campaign drafts (4 Sparks). Total: 204 Sparks. They have 1,500 included. Wallet untouched.
A busy five-seat venue pushing AI hard: 200 Concierge outbound messages (400 Sparks) + 20 complex decisions (200 Sparks) + 10 business health reports (100 Sparks) + 100 smart replies (100 Sparks) + 8 campaign drafts (8 Sparks) + 4 Style Previews (100 Sparks) = 908 Sparks. They have 2,500 included. Still within allocation.
For most venues, the included Sparks cover everything. The Wallet exists for the months when you push harder — high call volume, a batch of Style Previews, or a full run of business health reports across multiple periods.
Calculating ROI on Individual Actions
Start with smart replies, because the maths is simplest. Generating a suggested reply costs 1 Spark — one cent. If that reply saves you two minutes of typing, and you use it 50 times a month, you've saved over an hour and a half for 50 cents.
Apply the same logic to AI Concierge. If the Concierge handles 30 after-hours interactions per month that would otherwise go unanswered, and each is a potential $70 booking, the question is how many convert. Even at 30% conversion, that's nine bookings worth $630 from interactions that previously went to voicemail. The Spark cost for 30 interactions is roughly 60 to 120 Sparks depending on complexity — $0.60 to $1.20. The return isn't close.
Style Preview is the highest per-action cost at 25 Sparks ($0.25), but the context matters. If a client sees a visualisation of how a new colour would look on them and books a $150 colour appointment they wouldn't have otherwise, $0.25 is rounding error.
Keeping Your Wallet Healthy
The Wallet is designed to stay out of your way. Set a top-up threshold and OpenChair will notify you when your balance drops below it. Enable automatic top-ups and your balance reloads without manual intervention.
If your balance drops below $5, the platform will prompt you to top up — but it won't block your work. You stay in control of when and how much you load.
Your included Sparks carry forward, so there's no pressure to "use them or lose them." The system always draws from included Sparks first, then your Wallet. You can see the split in your usage history at any time.
The Bigger Picture on AI Costs
Pay-as-you-go AI pricing is a bet on transparency. It assumes operators are smart enough to evaluate value themselves, and that they'd rather pay for what they use than pay for a bundle that sounds impressive on a pricing page.
For most salon and barbershop owners, the included Spark allocation covers everything they need. The Wallet exists for the months when you push harder on campaigns, or when call volume spikes, or when you're running Style Previews for a full day of colour consultations. It's a buffer, not a baseline cost.
Smarter venue management doesn't require spending more. It requires spending where the return is clear, and knowing exactly what you're spending. That's what the Wallet and Sparks are built to do.