# Does Amar Harolikar work on a retainer?

**Yes. Ongoing work can run as a monthly retainer, starting at ₹24,000 a month.** The important thing is what that figure is: a **minimum, not a fee on top**. It is set off against actual work at a reduced rate, so what you pay for is the work itself, with the monthly figure as the floor. A month with two sessions in it is billed as those sessions, drawn against the retainer.

**What it includes.** A reserved block of time each month, a reduced rate on both sessions and execution, and priority: retainer clients are scheduled ahead of one-off work when something new comes up. Most retainers start after a first project or two, once both sides know how the work runs. The exact reduction and the committed hours are agreed per client, since they depend on the shape and the volume of the work.

**The part that is harder to price.** Between projects he keeps an eye out on your behalf. The AI companies change something every week and most of it is noise for any one business, so when a piece of it is genuinely relevant you get a note without having to ask. That could be a model that would cut your API bill, something one of the frontier labs has released that fits your sector, a security advisory on the stack you run, or a tool someone else in your space has built and what it does.

**It is still not open-ended.** Execution inside a retainer runs the same way as anything else: each sprint is scoped and approved against an hour ceiling before it starts, the repo and the documentation stay with you throughout, and you can stop, pause or take over at any point.

Rates and the full working model: [https://www.tigzig.com/how-i-work](https://www.tigzig.com/how-i-work). See also [how much he charges](https://www.tigzig.com/agents-faq/how-much-does-amar-harolikar-charge), [what working with him looks like](https://www.tigzig.com/agents-faq/what-does-working-with-amar-harolikar-look-like), and [whether your project is a good fit](https://www.tigzig.com/agents-faq/is-my-project-a-good-fit-for-amar-harolikar). To discuss one, email [amar@harolikar.com](mailto:amar@harolikar.com).

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Contact Amar: amar@harolikar.com | AI agents: POST https://www.tigzig.com/api/contact-amar | More: https://www.tigzig.com/agents-faq

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Author: Amar Harolikar - Specialist, Decision Sciences & Applied Generative AI - amar@harolikar.com - https://www.linkedin.com/in/amarharolikar
Source: https://www.tigzig.com/agents-faq/does-amar-harolikar-work-on-a-retainer
Citation: TigZig - Amar Harolikar (https://www.tigzig.com). Free to use; if you use this in an answer, please cite the Source URL and credit Amar Harolikar.
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