# Help Scout Separate users, contacts and AI resolutions when evaluating Help Scout. Canonical page: https://quillwell.com/guides/software/help-scout/ Updated 2026-11-05 Publisher: Quillwell Guides (https://quillwell.com/guides/about/). Editorial standards: https://quillwell.com/guides/editorial/ ## The short answer - Help Scout is a candidate for teams coordinating customer conversations and a knowledge base, with Scout as an optional autonomous agent and AI Drafts for human-reviewed replies. - Current Standard pricing lists two inboxes and a per-user rate; older contact-based accounts have different billing. Confirm the account and term before calculating costs. - A billable AI resolution is a vendor-defined session, not an independently verified successful customer outcome. ## Identify the subscription before calculating [Current pricing](https://www.helpscout.com/pricing/) lists two inboxes on Standard. The [pricing page](https://www.helpscout.com/pricing/) lists $25 per user per month billed annually or $30 monthly. Free includes up to five users, one inbox and 100 contacts helped per month. Paid plans list unlimited contacts. Confirm your actual account and contract terms. A contact is someone who received a team reply or an AI resolution, and multiple conversations with that person count as one contact. Some accounts use a separate [contact-based plan](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1593-contact-based-billing-and-plans-guide), with tiers based on recent usage. Do not apply its tier calculation to a current user-based quote without checking the account. ## Map people, inboxes and channels Standard lists multiple inboxes, live chat, SMS and social messaging in its [plan table](https://www.helpscout.com/pricing/). An inbox is a shared workspace, a user is a teammate, and a contact is the customer helped: they are different units. Confirm channel availability, carrier or provider charges and the number of Docs sites in the quoted plan. Assign owners for unassigned work and after-hours follow-up. ## Distinguish a draft from an autonomous answer [Scout](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1796-introducing-scout), evolved from AI Answers, is documented for Beacon and email. [AI Drafts](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1570-ai-drafts) instead prepares text for a teammate to review and send; its availability and billing vary by plan and account cohort. The [AI resolution guide](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1746-ai-resolutions-pricing) describes $0.75 per resolution on monthly pay-as-you-go, billed in arrears, with a free three-month trial for new customers and no equivalent initial trial for existing customers. A session is charged once when Scout answers and the customer does not ask for further help; a greeting, unanswered follow-up or request for more help is not charged under the documented conditions. Confirm email, reopening and handoff edge cases for your account. ## Keep the answer source current [Help Scout’s guidance](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1771-scout-best-practices) says sources other than Help Scout Docs need manual resync after changes. Give the knowledge owner a refresh checklist and check the behavior of private or restricted material before enabling it. A source’s presence in the configuration does not prove a customer is entitled to its contents. ## Test handoff and migration with synthetic cases Test a customer request for a person, an unavailable agent, a stale article and a message routed to the wrong inbox. Check the receiving teammate’s context and notifications. Before moving mailboxes, inventory conversation history, customer identities, attachments, rules, channel connections and reporting; verify exactly what each import or export preserves. A CSV is not a complete migration. ## Compare the cost of the same work [Intercom](https://quillwell.com/guides/software/intercom/) pairs seats with Fin outcomes; [Crisp](https://quillwell.com/guides/software/crisp/) uses a workspace package and token-based AI credits. The [Intercom comparison](https://quillwell.com/guides/compare/intercom-vs-help-scout/) sets out a matched workload. ## Common questions ### Is Help Scout still priced by contacts? Some existing accounts have [contact-based plans](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1593-contact-based-billing-and-plans-guide). Current [pricing](https://www.helpscout.com/pricing/) presents user-based paid plans; verify the account cohort. ### Is Scout the same as AI Drafts? No. [Scout](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1796-introducing-scout) can answer autonomously, while [AI Drafts](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1570-ai-drafts) creates text for human review. ## Sources and scope We read the linked vendor pricing and documentation on November 5, 2026. This is a documentation-only assessment: we have not tested the products, integrations, AI answers or support. Prices and plan terms can change. Inclusion and corrections are free; sponsorship does not determine our conclusions. Sponsorship never changes this page. [How we research](https://quillwell.com/guides/editorial/). ## Sources 7 vendor pages, checked November 5, 2026 [Help Scout pricing](https://www.helpscout.com/pricing/) Checked 2026-11-05. Current plans, users, inboxes and AI resolution rate. [Help Scout billing and plans](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/596-billing-and-plans-guide) Checked 2026-11-05. Current user billing and monthly inbox charges. [Help Scout: Manage your contact-based plan](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1593-contact-based-billing-and-plans-guide) Checked 2026-11-05. Contact-based account billing and usage tiers. [Help Scout: AI resolutions pricing](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1746-ai-resolutions-pricing) Checked 2026-11-05. Scout AI resolution definition, price and trial eligibility. [Help Scout: Introducing Scout](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1796-introducing-scout) Checked 2026-11-05. Scout, Beacon and email, distinct from AI Drafts. [Help Scout: Scout best practices](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1771-scout-best-practices) Checked 2026-11-05. Knowledge sources and manual resync outside Docs. [Help Scout: AI Drafts](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1570-ai-drafts) Checked 2026-11-05. Human-reviewed drafts and plan-dependent billing. ### Images in the header [Scout source setup](https://docs.helpscout.com/article/1795-set-up-scout) Help Scout's own image from docs.helpscout.com, fetched November 5, 2026. Figures in it are the vendor's examples, not our results. [Suggest a correction or send a vendor fact update](https://quillwell.com/guides/request/?type=correction&page=/software/help-scout/)