Clay Cost Audit

What it does

Most Clay overspend comes from one pattern: an expensive column running on every row when it only needed to run on the rows that passed a cheap filter. This skill prices the table column by column, finds the columns with no run condition, and rewrites the run order so the expensive work sits behind the cheap work.

When to use it

• what will this Clay table cost
• my Clay credits are gone
• how do I cut Clay spend
• price this Clay build
• credit optimization in Clay

What it needs from you

• columns: the column list with the provider or action behind each
• rows: current row count and the expected full volume
• prices: credit cost per column run, from the Clay column preview

How it works

1. List every column with a per run cost. Columns with zero cost are still listed because they are the candidates for run conditions.
2. Compute cost per row as the sum of every column that runs unconditionally.
3. Flag every paid column with no run condition. That is the finding, and it is usually most of the spend.
4. For each flagged column, name the cheap column that should gate it and the condition to write.
5. Re price the table with the gates applied, using a realistic pass rate for each gate rather than an optimistic one.
6. Present both numbers side by side, at the 10 row ramp, the 100 row ramp, and full volume.

What you get back

A two column table, before and after, priced at three volumes, plus the list of run conditions to add in the order that saves the most first.

The quality bar

• Every paid column appears in the table with a unit cost
• The pass rate used for each gate is stated, not implied
• Savings are given in credits and in the currency the user asked about
• The recommendation orders fixes by money saved, not by column order

Where it runs

• Claude Code
• Codex CLI
• Cursor
• MCP-compatible agents