If you want a Decagon or Sierra alternative you can try without a sales call, the shortlist is Lorikeet, Fin (now part of Salesforce), Zendesk AI agents, Help Scout, Gorgias and eesel AI. Each lets you sign up yourself and publishes its pricing, and four of them (Lorikeet, Fin, Zendesk and Help Scout) bill AI work per resolution or outcome. Decagon and Sierra both route buyers to their sales teams and publish no rates on their sites.

This guide is for support, operations and CX leads at fintech, healthtech and other regulated companies who want a resolution-focused AI agent and would rather test it on their own tickets than wait for a discovery call. It covers what Decagon and Sierra say they do well, then six tools you can start today, with the trial terms, pricing model, compliance claims and voice support each vendor publishes.

Key takeaways

• Decagon and Sierra are sales-led. Decagon's site offers "Get a demo" and "Contact Sales" and its /pricing URL returns a 404; Sierra's calls to action all point to a "Learn more" contact page. Neither publishes a free trial or per-unit rates.

• Pay-per-resolution is available without a contract negotiation. Fin publishes $0.99 per outcome, Help Scout publishes $0.75 per resolution, Gorgias publishes a price per automated interaction, and Lorikeet publishes $0.99 (Start) and $0.90 (Scale) per resolved chat, email or SMS ticket.

• Read the definition of a resolution. Fin counts an outcome when a customer does not ask for more help after a response, and also when Fin completes a workflow "including handoffs". Lorikeet does not charge for escalations to a person. Help Scout does not charge when a customer asks for more help.

• Regulated buyers should check certifications on the vendor's own trust page. HIPAA support is published by Lorikeet, Sierra, Zendesk (on its top Suite tier) and Help Scout (Pro plan), and by eesel AI on its Enterprise plan.

• Voice is the biggest gap in self-serve. Fin Voice is sold via sales, Help Scout handles phone through integrations, and Lorikeet's voice runs in the US, UK and Australia.

How we chose and checked these tools

We started from the jobs Decagon and Sierra are bought for: an AI agent that resolves customer conversations end to end, rather than drafting replies for a person. A tool made the numbered list only if a buyer can start using its AI agent without talking to sales: a self-serve sign-up or free trial, and published pricing for the AI agent itself. We then compared each one on the questions regulated teams ask first: trial terms, pricing model, whether billing is tied to resolutions, published compliance claims, and voice.

Every vendor fact below was checked on the vendor's own public pages on 22 October 2026, and each claim links to its source: Decagon, Sierra, Fin pricing, Zendesk pricing, Help Scout pricing, Gorgias pricing, eesel AI pricing and Front pricing. Where a vendor does not state something, the table says "Not published". Performance figures quoted here are each vendor's own reported numbers, not independent benchmarks.

Lorikeet publishes this guide and is one of the tools listed. We have tried to describe every product, including our own, using only what each vendor publishes, and we link to the source for each claim.

Decagon and Sierra: what they do well, and how you buy them

Decagon describes itself as "the AI concierge for every customer". Its standout idea is Agent Operating Procedures (AOPs), which let teams define agent workflows in natural language instead of a configuration language, across voice, chat and email in one intelligence layer. Its security page lists SSO with Okta and Microsoft Entra, zero data retention with AI providers such as OpenAI and Anthropic, PII redaction and an always-on QA system called Watchtower. On pricing, Decagon's own pricing post says it supports per-conversation and per-resolution pricing and that the majority of its customers choose per-conversation. It publishes no rates, and decagon.ai/pricing returned a 404 when we checked.

Sierra pitches itself as a conversational AI platform for large brands. Its Ghostwriter tool builds an agent from SOPs, transcripts and recordings, one agent can be deployed across chat, SMS, WhatsApp, email, voice and ChatGPT, and Sierra says customers "only pay for the value Sierra delivers with outcome-based pricing". Its trust page lists SOC 2, HIPAA, GDPR, PCI, FedRAMP High, CCPA, CSA STAR, ISO 27001 and ISO 42001, plus PCI DSS Level 1 Service Provider certification for payments. Sierra publishes no per-outcome rate and no trial.

Both are strong choices for large enterprises that want a vendor-led build. If you would rather start with your own tickets this week, the tools below are the closest self-serve matches. For head-to-head detail, see Lorikeet vs Decagon and Lorikeet vs Sierra, and our breakdown of Sierra AI pricing and alternatives.

Comparison table: self-serve alternatives to Decagon and Sierra

1. Lorikeet: regulated fintech and healthtech teams that want per-resolution billing

Lorikeet is an AI customer support platform built for complex and regulated businesses. One agent works across chat, email, voice, SMS and WhatsApp, pulls live context from your systems, follows your policies and resolves issues end to end, with guardrails and quality scoring built in. It connects natively to Zendesk, Intercom, Salesforce, HubSpot, Front, Help Scout and Genesys Cloud, among others.

Pricing and trial, as published. The pricing page lists Start at $2,100/mo and Scale at $5,100/mo, both paid annually, with resolution rates of $0.99 (Start) and $0.90 (Scale) for chat, email and SMS, and $1.50 or $1.20 for voice (3-minute average). You are charged only for successfully resolved tickets; escalations to a person are not charged. There is a 30-day free trial with a work email; you add a card at checkout and nothing is charged until the trial ends. An AI assistant can also start the sign-up for you through a plain HTTP endpoint, and you finish in your own browser.

Regulated fit. Start and Scale include ISO 27001, SOC 2 Type 2 and a standard DPA or Business Associate Agreement (incl. HIPAA), and the trust page lists zero-data-retention agreements with model vendors. Fintech customers include Hnry, whose agent handled 17,000+ conversations in its first month and automated around 70% in its peak tax week, and Taptap Send, which runs on European-hosted infrastructure across email, voice and chat. The agent answers account and process questions; it is not set up to give financial or clinical advice.

Trade-offs. Start and Scale are billed annually, so the trial is your month to decide before a yearly commitment. Data residency on Start and Scale is the USA; custom residency sits on the Signature plan, which carries a $75K platform fee. Voice is available in the US, UK and Australia only.

Best for: fintech, healthtech and insurance teams that want Decagon-style resolution with published rates and a free trial.

2. Fin (now part of Salesforce): fastest self-serve start on an existing helpdesk

Fin, formerly Intercom, is the AI agent that Salesforce completed its acquisition of on 10 September 2026. Fin's own facts page says it is used by more than 12,000 customers, reports an average resolution rate of 76% across conversations it is involved in, and says teams can go live in hours without engineers. It runs natively on the Intercom helpdesk and also on Zendesk, Salesforce, HubSpot and Freshdesk.

Pricing and trial. The pricing page lists $0.99 per outcome, a 14-day free trial with no credit card, and Intercom helpdesk seats from $19 per seat/mo. On another helpdesk there is a $49/mo minimum that includes 50 outcomes and no seat costs. Fin says you pay nothing if it cannot answer or the customer asks for a human, and you are charged at most once per conversation.

Trade-offs. An outcome also counts when the customer simply does not ask for more help, or when Fin completes a workflow including a handoff, so model your bill against that definition. Fin Voice is "available via sales" at $1.99 per voice outcome, so voice is not self-serve. Compliance details live on Intercom's Trust Portal rather than the pricing page.

Best for: chat-and-email-first teams that want to switch on an AI agent this afternoon, especially if they already run Intercom.

3. Zendesk AI agents: teams that want AI and the helpdesk on one bill

Zendesk includes AI agents in every Suite and Support plan. Its pricing page says the agents can "resolve up to 80% of even the most complex service issues across any channel", and lists AI agents for messaging, email and voice, plus an AI agent builder that creates agents from natural-language procedure descriptions. The AI agents page also covers voice.

Pricing and trial. Suite Team is US$55 and Suite Professional US$115 per agent per month, paid yearly, and each plan includes a set number of automated resolutions. Billing for AI usage is per automated resolution, defined as a request resolved by the AI agent "without any escalation to a human agent", with committed or pay-as-you-go options for extra volume. The 14-day trial gives you Suite Professional, though Zendesk says AI capabilities in the trial "may vary".

Regulated fit and trade-offs. Zendesk offers a Business Associate Agreement and lists HIPAA enablement on its top Suite tier, which is sales-led ("Talk to Sales"), and data-centre location in the US, APAC, EEA or UK as an add-on. Seat pricing applies on top of AI resolutions, and the per-resolution price beyond the included allowance is not printed on the pricing page.

Best for: teams already on Zendesk, or replacing a helpdesk at the same time.

4. Help Scout: lowest published per-resolution rate for smaller teams

Help Scout is a helpdesk with an AI add-on (called Envoy on the plan cards and AI Answers in the FAQ) that resolves customer questions without a person. Its pricing page says you can configure the AI "in minutes" by adding your website or other sources, and reports an average resolution rate of 73%.

Pricing and trial. The AI add-on is $0.75 per resolution, billed monthly, with a monthly spending cap you set. A resolution counts only when the customer gets an AI response and does not escalate, search the knowledge base, ask more questions or say they need more help. Plans run from $25 (Standard) to $75 (Pro) per user per month. Standard and Plus come with a 15-day trial and no credit card, and every new account gets three months of free, unlimited AI resolutions.

Trade-offs. HIPAA compliance is listed only on Pro, and trialling Pro means talking to sales. Phone and voice are handled "via integration", so this is not a voice AI agent. The agent is aimed at knowledge-based answers more than multi-step account actions.

Best for: small and mid-sized teams who mostly answer questions by email and chat and want the cheapest per-resolution test.

5. Gorgias: ecommerce brands on Shopify

Gorgias is a helpdesk and AI agent built for ecommerce. Its AI Agent page describes resolving support questions, converting shoppers in chat and automating actions such as returns and order tracking, with your Shopify store connected as a knowledge source.

Pricing and trial. The pricing page puts "AI Agent on every plan, pay only when it resolves a conversation". Helpdesk plus AI Agent starts at $40/mo on monthly billing, and the per automated interaction rate is listed from $1.00 down to $0.85 at higher tiers. Most plans show "Start free trial" with "No credit card required". The trial length is not published on the pricing page.

Trade-offs. Gorgias is ecommerce-specific, and we found no regulated-industry certifications on the pages we checked, so it is a weak fit for fintech or healthcare. Voice is offered as phone support in the helpdesk; an AI voice agent is not listed.

Best for: Shopify and other ecommerce brands that want returns and order tracking automated.

6. eesel AI: flat monthly credits on top of your current helpdesk

eesel AI plugs into helpdesks such as Zendesk and Freshdesk, plus Slack and a chat bubble. Its pricing page offers a free plan with 100 credits to try every feature and integration, and you only add a card when you pick a plan.

Pricing. The Teammate plan starts at $299/mo for 500 credits and scales to $1,749/mo for 5,000. A ticket or chat is one credit however long it runs, and eesel says you pay for the plan and nothing else, with no per-seat price. It offers EU or US data residency on every plan.

Trade-offs. You pay for every ticket the agent works on, not only the ones it resolves, which is the main difference from Decagon's per-resolution option or Sierra's outcome-based pricing. HIPAA with a signed BAA is on the Enterprise plan (contact us), and the page says SOC 2 Type II is "underway". Phone appears only in its managed support service.

Best for: teams that want a predictable monthly number and are comfortable paying per ticket handled.

Also sales-led: Gradient Labs and Front Autopilot

Two other names come up in Decagon and Sierra shortlists but did not make the numbered list, because their AI agent is bought through sales. Gradient Labs is purpose-built for financial services with FS-specific guardrails and an outcomes-based model where "you pay only for successful query resolutions", but it publishes no rates and its calls to action are "Request a demo". Front has a 14-day self-serve trial of its helpdesk with no credit card, but its Autopilot AI agent is listed at "Starting at $0.05 /conversation" with "Talk to sales".

Questions to ask before you pick

1. What exactly counts as a billable resolution? Ask whether handoffs, silent customers and reopened conversations are charged. Each per-resolution vendor above publishes its own definition, and they differ.

2. Can I test on real tickets inside the trial? A 14-day trial is tight if you need an integration approved by security first. A 30-day trial, or Help Scout's three months of free AI resolutions give more room.

3. Which compliance documents can I get before data flows? For healthcare, confirm the BAA is available on the plan you will buy, not only on an enterprise tier.

4. Can the agent take actions, or only answer? Decagon and Sierra are bought for actions such as refunds and account changes. Check which self-serve tools can call your systems.

5. Where are the hard boundaries? In fintech the agent should explain processes, not give financial advice; in healthtech it should handle logistics and route anything clinical to licensed staff.

6. Do you need voice now? If yes, check regions and whether voice is self-serve or sales-led.

If you are comparing trials more broadly, our guide to AI customer service software with a free trial covers more tools, and signing up for AI customer support from ChatGPT or Claude explains agent sign-up. To test Lorikeet on your own tickets, start a 30-day free trial.