Briefing note. An artificial intelligence (AI) assistant licence is a recurring cost per seat. It earns its keep only when the seat is used for work that matters. Measure active use weekly, reclaim idle seats on a fixed cycle, and judge value on process outcomes, not self-reported minutes.
Start with the arithmetic
All prices in this note are in United States dollars. Microsoft announced Microsoft 365 Copilot for enterprise customers at a list price of $30 per user per month, with general availability on November 1, 2023 [1]. Negotiated prices differ. The arithmetic does not.
| Seats | Annual cost at list | Waste if 30% idle |
|---|---|---|
| 1,000 | $360,000 | $108,000 |
| 10,000 | $3.6 million | $1.08 million |
| 50,000 | $18 million | $5.4 million |
The 30% is an illustration, not a benchmark. Your own number is in your usage data.
Licence spend in a large bank is rarely lost in one decision. It leaks a few seats at a time. In a large estate, small per-seat leaks compound into a budget line, and nobody sees them until someone counts.
Measure active use, not assigned seats
Assigned seats tell you what you bought. Active use tells you what you got.
Microsoft’s Copilot usage report for administrators shows enabled users, active users and the active users rate, with a last activity date for each user [2]. User names are hidden in usage reports by default [2]. Turning them on is a privacy decision. Involve privacy and human resources before you do it.
The definition of “active” changes the answer. Two public-sector evaluations show how much:
- A United Kingdom cross-government experiment gave licences to 20,000 employees in 12 organizations for three months in late 2024. It counted a user as active after at least one interaction in the previous 30 days. On that definition, adoption peaked at 83% [3].
- The UK Department for Business and Trade piloted 1,000 licences over the same period. Its weekly active rate averaged 64%. Daily active use averaged 30% on working days. Licence holders averaged about 1.14 Copilot actions per working day [4].
Same product, same quarter, very different headline numbers. Monthly active use is a floor. For a paid seat, weekly active use is the test I would apply.
| Metric | Definition | Use it for |
|---|---|---|
| Monthly active rate | One or more prompts in 30 days | A floor only |
| Weekly active rate | One or more prompts in 7 days | Seat retention |
| Active days per user | Days with prompts in the period | Habit |
| Apps per user | Distinct apps with activity | Depth of use |
Reclaim on a fixed cycle
Idle seats are the easiest saving in the program. A reclaim policy needs five rules:
- Assign seats to named roles with a stated use case, not by grade or seniority.
- Notify the user and manager at 30 days without activity, with a training offer.
- Reclaim at 60 days without activity and return the seat to a pool.
- Reissue from a waiting list of requesters who have completed training.
- Review the pool with finance every quarter.
Check your agreement first. If seat counts are fixed for the term, reassignment is your lever during the term. Right-sizing is your lever at renewal.
Tier the estate. Since January 2025, Microsoft has offered Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat to commercial customers free of charge, with pay-as-you-go agents on top [5]. Not every employee needs a paid seat. Reserve paid seats for roles whose work runs through email, meetings, documents and spreadsheets every day.
Renewals need a fresh model too. In December 2025, Microsoft announced list price changes for Microsoft 365 suite subscriptions, effective July 1, 2026 [6]. The base licence under the assistant is moving. Budget for both lines.
Value beyond “time saved”
Self-reported time saved is the most quoted number and the weakest. The UK cross-government experiment reported an average saving of 26 minutes per day, self-reported through a survey [3]. The Department for Business and Trade evaluation found small time savings on most tasks. It also found that some tasks took longer, and it “did not find evidence that time savings have led to improved productivity” [4].
Neither result says the tool lacks value. Both say that minutes are not the measure. Measure work outcomes instead:
| Measure | How | Cadence |
|---|---|---|
| Cycle time | Time to a defined output, before and after | Quarterly |
| Rework | Corrections found in review | Monthly |
| External spend | Contractor and agency hours avoided | Quarterly |
| Risk events | Data loss alerts and policy breaches | Monthly |
Pick processes a bank already measures. First drafts of credit memos. Client correspondence. Procedure documents. Minutes for governance forums. Set a baseline before licensing. Without a baseline there is no return on investment, only an opinion.
The quarterly licence review
Put one page in front of the chief information officer and the chief financial officer each quarter:
- Seats owned, seats assigned and the weekly active rate.
- Seats reclaimed and reissued this quarter.
- Cost per weekly active user.
- Outcome measures against baseline, by business line.
- Renewal date, notice period and modelled price.
- Decision requested: expand, hold or reduce.
Cost per weekly active user is the number that ends debates. At $30 per seat and a 60% weekly active rate, the effective cost is $50 per active user per month. At 90%, it is about $33. Adoption work pays for itself in that gap.
Licences are not a technology decision. They are a recurring commitment that needs an owner, a measure and a review date.
References
- J. Spataro, “Announcing Microsoft 365 Copilot general availability and Microsoft 365 Chat,” Microsoft 365 Blog, Sept. 21, 2023.
- Microsoft, “Microsoft 365 reports in the admin center: Microsoft 365 Copilot usage,” Microsoft Learn, 2025.
- Government Digital Service, “Microsoft 365 Copilot Experiment: Cross-Government Findings Report,” GOV.UK, June 2, 2025.
- Department for Business and Trade, “The Evaluation of the M365 Copilot Pilot in the Department for Business and Trade,” GOV.UK, Aug. 2025.
- J. Spataro, “Copilot for all: Introducing Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat,” Microsoft 365 Blog, Jan. 15, 2025.
- N. Herskowitz, “Advancing Microsoft 365: New capabilities and pricing update,” Microsoft 365 Blog, Dec. 4, 2025.