Hiring an AI back office assistant: what does it save vs staff?

What does an AI back office assistant cost?

An AI back office assistant costs €295 to €595 one-off setup and €149 to €349 per month per module at Van Borg Agency: email, receipts and invoices, leads into your CRM, reminders or chasing unpaid invoices. An in-house back office employee, for comparison, costs an employer upwards of €3,800 per month in wages and overhead.

The rent covers everything: hosting, AI usage, the connection to your own inbox, accounting package and calendar, and ongoing development. You rent exactly the modules you need, and add more once there's room.

What does an in-house back office employee cost?

A back office employee in the Netherlands earns on average €2,840 gross per month, with a range of €2,415 to €3,270 (Werkzoeken.nl). On top of that comes 30 to 40% in employer costs: social security contributions, pension and holiday pay (Ondernemen met Personeel).

Add the average of 35%, and you're paying roughly €3,830 per month as an employer for one back office employee, excluding a workstation, a laptop and the time it takes to train someone in. A module at Van Borg Agency at €349 per month is less than a tenth of that cost, and you're not locked into a contract anywhere.

What does an AI back office assistant actually do?

Six modules, which you rent separately or together and which all connect to your own systems instead of a separate platform:

• Email assistant (€395 setup, €249/mo): reads your inbox, answers the recurring questions from your own knowledge base and drafts the rest.
• Admin agent (€495 setup, €349/mo): reads receipts and purchase invoices and books them into Exact, e-Boekhouden, Moneybird and comparable packages.
• Lead connector (€295 setup, €149/mo): every enquiry through your site, phone, WhatsApp or a form lands complete in your CRM or calendar.
• Reminder agent (€295 setup, €149/mo): sends confirmations and reminders, and picks up a cancellation with a new proposal.
• Receivables agent (€295 setup, €149/mo): chases outstanding invoices with a friendly reminder on day 3, 14 and 30.
• Follow-up agent (€595 setup, €299/mo): calls out on its own to chase quotes and reminders, with a real conversation instead of a message.

More on how the modules work together is on the AI back office page, including the calculator for your own combination.

Does the AI back office fully replace my employee?

Usually not, and that's deliberate. The agent books nothing it isn't sure about: an entry it can't place gets queued with a question attached rather than guessed. You and your bookkeeper keep checking, and the tax return stays human work.

What does change: the recurring work that now sits waiting or gets caught up on in the evening is processed within a day. At businesses that can't find or afford a back office employee, the agent fills exactly that gap.

When does it pay off, and how fast does it go live?

Every module goes live within 1 to 2 weeks, with a check step before anything goes out automatically. It pays off quickly: missing 3 to 4 hours of admin per week for lack of time already means one module at €149 to €349 per month pays for itself against an employee's hourly rate, or worse, your own evening hours.

Not sure which module pays off most? We map it in the free AI workflow scan of 30 to 45 minutes, or work out your own combination on the pricing page.