Help Scout

Help Scout sells to teams who want a shared inbox rather than a ticket queue, and who count seats. Its top plan stops at "the highest level of scale and security" rather than claiming enterprise.

Standard is $25 per user per month, Plus $45 and Pro $75, all quoted at the annual prepay rate against a stated 16% discount. Monthly billing exists, but Help Scout publishes no monthly per-user rate. Paid plans add live chat, SMS, WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger. AI Answers is metered at $0.75 per resolution with no included allowance on any plan, and a session counts only when the customer does not escalate, search the knowledge base or ask for more help.

Pro imposes a ten-user minimum and cannot be trialled without talking to sales. SSO/SAML, IP restrictions and HIPAA are add-ons with no published price, and none of them reach Standard. SCIM, audit logs and ISO 27001 appear nowhere in the plan matrix. The in-app export returns reporting data only, "with the exception of conversation thread contents", so conversation bodies come out through the API or not at all. The contact list is a support request returning names and emails. Help Scout also states outright that saved replies, workflows and knowledge base articles cannot be imported.

Front and Helply sell the same shared-inbox shape. Teams that outgrow the ten-user Pro floor land on Zendesk, which publishes audit logs and charges $1.50 per automated resolution against Help Scout's $0.75. It files under shared inbox software.