Examples

Five real runs.
Nothing cleaned up.

On 30 July 2026 we handed five jobs to Else on the live product, one after another. Below is exactly what we typed, what came back, and what each run cost. Three produced a file you can open. Two came back with nothing. All five are here.

5
runs, back to back, on one afternoon
3
finished files, linked below and unedited
2
runs that produced nothing at all
$2.3137
total across all five, every one on the Auto tier
The uncomfortable part first. We set the spend limit on every one of these runs to $0.15 — the default. Four of the five receipts came in above it — between $0.502 and $0.6169, all four on the Auto tier — because Else stops itself between steps: a single long step can finish, and be billed, before the run pauses. Its own words when that happens, verbatim from the screen: “I stopped here because this turn reached its spending limit for a single turn. You were only charged for the work that actually ran. Ask me to continue and I'll pick up from what's already done.” Treat the limit as a brake, not a wall. We are showing you the receipts rather than the ones we wish we had.
Slide deck File delivered · write-up cut short

“Build me a 6-slide HTML deck I can open in a browser, titled "Why our support queue is slow". Use only these numbers: 4,120 tickets last quarter; median first reply 9h 40m; 38% of tickets are password resets; 2 agents on weekends vs 6 on weekdays; satisfaction 3.4 out of 5. Include one chart slide and one recommendations slide. Save it to /outputs as a single self-contained .html file.”

What it did
  1. Planned the run, and showed the plan before starting: draft a self-contained deck with no external assets, hand-build the chart, write it out, then read it back to check.
  2. Worked in the secure workspace — wrote the file, then re-read it.
  3. Stopped at the spend ceiling for the step it was on, after 1m 34s, before it could write its summary in the conversation.
What we got

The deck itself is complete: six slides, a title card, a five-number summary, two diagnosis slides, a chart slide with bars drawn from the figures we gave it, and four ranked recommendations. It kept itself honest about the data — the last slide reads “No other numbers have been estimated or added.” Keyboard navigation and a present mode were not asked for; it added them anyway.

support-queue-deck.html 15.5 KB · opens in a new page

$0.5102 Auto tier 1m 34s · spend limit set to $0.15
Report File delivered · write-up cut short

“We got three quotes to re-roof a 92 sq m house and I can't hold them in my head. Quote A: 14,200 pounds, slate, 12-year workmanship guarantee, can start in 3 weeks, scaffolding included, 40% deposit. Quote B: 11,650 pounds, concrete tile, 5-year guarantee, can start next week, scaffolding charged separately at about 1,400 pounds, 25% deposit. Quote C: 16,900 pounds, slate, 20-year insurance-backed guarantee, earliest start is 9 weeks away, scaffolding and waste removal included, no deposit until work starts. Build me a decision table comparing true total cost, risk and timing, then say plainly which one you'd pick and what you'd ask each of them before signing. Save it to /outputs as a markdown file.”

What it did
  1. Said up front it would compare on landed cost rather than headline price, then on risk and timing, then give a straight pick and a question list.
  2. Computed the numbers, wrote the table, then went back to verify its own arithmetic.
  3. Stopped at the spend ceiling for the step it was on, after 1m 46s, with the file already written.
What we got

A five-section decision table, a pick, and a nine-question list to put to all three builders. It found the thing we hadn't: adding scaffolding back turns the cheapest quote's £2,550 advantage into £1,150, and on cost per year of cover the cheap quote is the worst of the three. Where a cost was missing it flagged it instead of guessing — “Waste removal: Not stated — ask” — and it refused to rank the two slate quotes without knowing whether the slate is natural or imitation.

reroof-quote-comparison.md 9.0 KB · plain text

$0.502 Auto tier 1m 46s · spend limit set to $0.15
Email Finished, start to end

“Write the email I've been putting off. I have to tell a freelance designer we're not renewing her contract after 14 months. The real reason is our budget was cut, not her work — and I genuinely want to hire her again next year. Under 200 words, warm but unambiguous, no corporate filler, no "synergy", no apologising three times. Save the final version to /outputs as a markdown file.”

What it did
  1. Drafted the email, counted the words itself, edited it back under the limit, and saved it.
  2. Came back with the file plus its reasoning: why the bad news is in the first sentence, why it used no apology at all, why the praise is specific, and why the rehire promise is bounded to something you can actually keep.
  3. Flagged the four placeholders to fill in, and told us not to fake the one about a specific project: “If nothing comes to mind, cut that sentence rather than fake it.”
What we got

A 180-word email, sendable after four fill-ins, plus two decisions it handed back to us rather than deciding for us — how much notice she gets, and whether to say it on a call first.

contract-non-renewal-email.md 1.1 KB · plain text

$0.0819 Auto tier 22s · spend limit set to $0.15
Research Nothing produced

“Compare the three best-reviewed countertop air fryers under $150 sold in the US right now. Use current sources and cite them. Give me a comparison table with capacity, wattage, price, and the single biggest complaint reviewers make about each one. Save the finished comparison to /outputs as a markdown file.”

Where it stopped
  1. Turned on the Web research add-on, searched, and began reading full reviews on two publications' sites.
  2. Reported back mid-run: “Good consensus is emerging. Let me fetch the full reviews for specs and criticisms.”
  3. Hit the spend ceiling for that step at 38 seconds and stopped. No table, no file, no answer — the run ended reading “3 stages · no answer produced”.
What we got

Nothing usable. We were charged $0.6169 for research that never reached a conclusion. Reading several long review pages inside one step is expensive, and on this run the ceiling arrived first. It did tell us plainly that it had stopped and why, and offered to continue from where it got to — we didn't take it up, so that this page could show you the run as it actually ended.

No file produced

$0.6169 Auto tier 38s · spend limit set to $0.15
Research Nothing produced

“Short, tight research job — keep it cheap. Compare renting vs buying a home broadband router in the UK. Search the web, open at most two pages, and cite what you use. Give me a markdown table with typical monthly rental cost, typical one-off purchase cost, and the main catch of each option, plus a two-line verdict. Save it to /outputs as a markdown file.”

Where it stopped
  1. Read the instruction back correctly, including the cost constraint: “I'll search for UK broadband router rental/purchase costs, open at most two pages, then write the table and verdict to /outputs.”
  2. Searched and started reading.
  3. Hit the spend ceiling for that step after 2m 22s. “2 stages · no answer produced.” No table, no file.
What we got

Nothing, again, on a job we had deliberately written to be small — and $0.6027 charged for it. Asking it to keep a research run cheap does not currently make one cheap. This is the clearest limitation on this page: today, a run that reads its way around the open web is the one most likely to stop before it delivers. Everything else on this page finished its file.

No file produced

$0.6027 Auto tier 2m 22s · spend limit set to $0.15
How to read this page

Every number here came off a receipt.

Not a model, not an average, not a forecast. Each amount is the figure Else itself printed at the end of that run, next to the engine tier that produced it — all five ran on Auto, which picks the tier for you. A different tier gives a different receipt, which is why an amount on this site never appears without the tier beside it.

The three files are byte-for-byte what Else wrote. We did not edit, reformat, restyle or trim them, and we did not rewrite the two runs that failed into something more flattering. If a run came back empty, it says so.

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