Quick answer
Pick a partner that will tell you what not to automate, doesn't earn a margin on the software they recommend, and has something working in weeks rather than months. If your problem is a handful of repetitive processes eating your team's time, that's usually a specialist implementation partner, whatever size you are.
Bring one process that annoys you
We'll give you a rough ROI estimate on a free 30-minute call.
- Assessment £5,000, credited against the build
- Builds from £10,000
- Support from £250 a month
Free 30-minute call. No obligation.
Whether you're looking for an AI automation consultancy, an agency, a consultant or a partner, the questions are the same, so this guide says 'partner' throughout.
A note before you read on. We publish this guide and we're one of the options in it. Most 'best AI agency' lists are written by an agency that ranks itself first. We'd rather say so up front and let you judge the rest on whether it's useful.
How much does an AI automation partner cost?
Almost nobody in this market publishes a price. McKinsey doesn't, Accenture doesn't, and the large AI practices don't publish rate cards at all. So every figure below except ours is an estimate. The table uses the ranges in Bosio Digital's 2026 AI consulting cost guide, which line up with other published benchmarks. Estimates do vary between sources, boutique rates especially, so treat them as a guide to scale rather than a quote.
| Type of partner | Estimated cost | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| MBB (McKinsey, BCG, Bain) | $500 to $1,000+ an hour | Strategy and prototypes, months to years |
| Big Four (Deloitte, PwC, EY, KPMG) | $400 to $800 an hour | Advisory, usually alongside a separate build partner |
| Mid-tier implementation (Accenture, IBM, Capgemini) | $400 to $700 an hour | Large-scale technical integration |
| Specialist implementation partner | $350 to $650 an hour | Senior-led delivery, narrower and deeper |
| Independent consultant | $150 to $350 an hour | One person, advice or a small build |
| AutomalyPublished, not estimated | £5,000 assessment (about $6,700), builds from £10,000 (about $13,400), support from £250 a month (about $340) | A working system your team runs. Assessment in 1 week, then build in 3 to 4 weeks |
MBB (McKinsey, BCG, Bain)
Estimated cost: $500 to $1,000+ an hour
What you get: Strategy and prototypes, months to years
Big Four (Deloitte, PwC, EY, KPMG)
Estimated cost: $400 to $800 an hour
What you get: Advisory, usually alongside a separate build partner
Mid-tier implementation (Accenture, IBM, Capgemini)
Estimated cost: $400 to $700 an hour
What you get: Large-scale technical integration
Specialist implementation partner
Estimated cost: $350 to $650 an hour
What you get: Senior-led delivery, narrower and deeper
Independent consultant
Estimated cost: $150 to $350 an hour
What you get: One person, advice or a small build
Automaly
Published, not estimated
Estimated cost: £5,000 assessment (about $6,700), builds from £10,000 (about $13,400), support from £250 a month (about $340)
What you get: A working system your team runs. Assessment in 1 week, then build in 3 to 4 weeks
By engagement rather than by the hour, a readiness assessment is commonly put at $25,000 to $75,000, a mid-market programme at $35,000 to $150,000, and enterprise transformation starts around $500,000.
Our pricing
The assessment is £5,000 and it's optional. If it doesn't find at least five automation opportunities with positive ROI, you don't pay for it. If you go ahead with a build, the £5,000 comes off the price.
The assessment takes a week. It includes stakeholder interviews, and you get a prioritised, ROI-backed roadmap showing what's worth automating and what each item would cost to build.
Builds start at £10,000. Support starts at £250 a month.
The time it takes from your side is 45 minutes to an hour per process, walked through end to end with whoever actually does the work.
Want to see what that looks like for your business? Book a free 30-minute call, bring one process, and we'll give you a rough ROI estimate while you're on it.
Free 30-minute call. No obligation.
What should you ask a partner before you sign?
Six questions. The answers will tell you more than a sales deck.
01Will you tell me what not to automate?
An assessment that only comes back with opportunities is a sales document. Some processes should be deleted rather than automated, some are about to change, and some cost less to run by hand than to build.
Ask for an example of something they advised a client against. If they can't give you one, they've never said no.
02Do you resell the software you're recommending?
Plenty of agencies earn a margin or a referral fee on the platforms they put you on. That's not wrong in itself, but it changes what gets recommended, and you want to know before the recommendation rather than after.
Ask directly. The answer takes one sentence.
03What do I own at the end?
Some builds leave you with a documented system your team can run. Others leave you with something only the agency understands, on accounts only they can get into - a monthly fee you can't walk away from.
Ask what happens if you end the relationship in six months. Do the automations keep running, do you have the credentials, is anything written down?
04How long before the first thing works?
A first build should be working in two to six weeks. If it's going to take six months, the scope is wrong.
Be wary of anyone who wants to spend months mapping your whole operation before building anything.
05Who does the work, and will I meet them?
At larger firms the people who win the work usually aren't the people who deliver it. That's how they're structured, and it means the person who understood your problem in the pitch may never touch your account again.
Ask to meet whoever will build it, before you sign.
06How do you handle data security, and what happens when the AI gets it wrong?
Every AI system gets things wrong sometimes. What matters is whether the build is designed for it. A good partner can tell you where your data goes, which models see it, who approves an action before it happens, and what gets logged.
Ask what happens when the system isn't sure. The right answer is that it hands the case to a person rather than guessing. For the full list of what to check, see our AI agent governance checklist.
Which kind of partner suits your business?
Large consultancies
are built for board-level transformation, heavily regulated environments and organisations that need the name on the report. If you want something working this quarter, they're the wrong shape. The engagement is built around analysis and the build usually gets handed to someone else.
Offshore development shops
are good value if you already know exactly what you want and can write the spec. You're buying hands, not judgement. Give them a spec written by someone who doesn't understand the process and you'll get a system nobody uses.
Generalist automation agencies
suit simple integrations - connecting two tools, syncing a form to your CRM, a standard workflow built from templates. They're less suited to work where the process itself needs redesigning first, because they build what you ask for rather than questioning whether it's the right thing to build.
Specialist implementation partners
suit businesses with one or more high-volume manual processes, from a handful of people to a few hundred. Small enough that you meet everyone, focused enough that they've seen your problem before. They're the wrong choice for enterprise-scale programmes, or anywhere procurement needs a supplier of a certain size.
A quick way to narrow it down
- Need a strategy the board will sign off
- a large consultancy
- Already written the spec
- an offshore shop
- Simple software integration
- a generalist automation agency
- A process eating your team's week
- a specialist implementation partner - that's us
Are you ready for an AI automation partner?
Some businesses are ready now. Some are better off waiting a few months, and a partner worth hiring will tell you which.
Signs you're ready
- A process runs many times a week and follows roughly the same steps. Quoting, onboarding, enquiry handling, reporting. Volume and repetition are what make automation pay back.
- It's taking real hours from people who should be doing something else. If you can point at who does it and roughly how long it takes, you're most of the way to a business case.
- Someone can decide how the process should work. Not a committee - one person who can sign off the new way of doing it.
- You're about to hire someone to cover it. That's the cheapest point to automate - before the hire, not after.
Signs to wait
- Nobody's agreed how the process should work. Automation runs a process that exists. It can't settle an argument about what the process is - it just makes the argument run faster. Get the people who do the work in a room and write down the steps as they actually happen, not as the manual says. Once there's one agreed version, you're ready. Or book the assessment - agreeing the process as it actually runs is the first thing it does.
- The process is about to change. A new system going in, a restructure, a product change. Automate now and you'll pay to rebuild it in six months. Let the change bed in, then automate the process you actually end up with.
- You can't get at the systems or the data. If the software that holds the data won't give API access, or the process lives in people's heads, the build stalls waiting for it. Check whether your plan includes API access before anything else.
- Or build it in-house. If you've got a person with the aptitude and a couple of weeks, the platforms are learnable and you'll end up with capability rather than a supplier, though it may take longer to see progress.
Where does Automaly fit?
We're a specialist implementation partner. We assess how your operations actually run, find where automation will pay back, redesign the process around it, build it, and train your team to run it.
In terms of results, three recent engagements:
In2ition
In2ition, a medical device market research firm, cut the cost of writing research surveys by 60% with an AI agent trained on their own survey library.
Complete Civil Engineering
Complete Civil Engineering, a civils contractor, cut the cost of their project management process by 70% by automating how project email is read, matched to the right job and logged.
Peak Beverage
Peak Beverage, an event beverage company, increased sales productivity by 50% with an AI agent that drafts replies to inbound enquiries.
As for the questions above, here's where we stand.
- Will you tell me what not to automate?
- We told a small specialist law firm not to automate the review of complex legal cases. The work turns on the nuances of each matter, and one wrong call from the AI would have cost more than the automation could ever save. There's more on where AI agents do and don't work in law firms.
- Do you resell the software you're recommending?
- We don't resell software licences, so nothing we recommend earns us a margin.
- What do I own at the end?
- Everything we build is documented and handed over, and your team is trained to run it. No lock-in and no credentials only we hold.
- How long before the first thing works?
- First builds are typically live in three to four weeks.
- Who does the work, and will I meet them?
- You'll meet whoever builds it before you sign.
- How do you handle data security, and what happens when the AI gets it wrong?
- Anything the system isn't confident about goes to a person, never straight into a live record. We agree where your data goes and what gets logged before we build.
Questions people ask
Which is the best AI automation consulting firm?
There isn't one best firm, because they're built for different jobs. Decide first whether you need advice, a working system, or hands to build something you've already specified - the shortlist follows from that.
What does AI automation cost?
Ours starts at £10,000 for a first build, rising with the number of systems it touches, plus an optional £5,000 assessment that comes off the build price. Large consultancy programmes are commonly estimated at $500,000 and up. Support usually runs to a few hundred pounds a month.
Is there a best AI automation consultant for small businesses?
Size matters less than the process. A six-person firm with one process eating a day a week can justify a build; a larger firm with a few scattered annoyances often can't. Work out what the process costs you now and compare it with the build price before you call anyone.
How long does an AI automation project take?
A first build should be working in two to six weeks. Ours typically take three to four, after a one-week assessment. Anything much longer usually means the scope is wrong or the process wasn't settled before building started.
What should I look for in a proposal?
What you own at the end, who builds it, what happens if you stop, and what they advised against doing. The last one tells you the most.