spend-circuit-breaker

OpenClaw has no built-in hard spending cap. This skill monitors session logs to estimate cumulative API cost, alerts at configurable thresholds, and automatically pauses non-essential cron automations when the monthly budget ceiling is hit.

Setup (first run)

Before the skill is useful, record your monthly budget in state:

python3 check.py --set-budget 50        # $50/month hard cap
python3 check.py --set-alert 0.5 0.75   # Alert at 50% and 75%

Cron Wakeup Behaviour

Runs every 4 hours (cron: "0 */4 * * *"). On each wakeup:

1. Read ~/.openclaw/skill-state/spend-circuit-breaker/state.yaml — load monthly_budget_usd and spend_this_month_usd
2. Parse OpenClaw session logs from ~/.openclaw/sessions/ to estimate new spend since last_checked_at (model × token counts × price table)
3. Update spend_this_month_usd and last_checked_at in state
4. Apply threshold logic (see below)
5. Reset spend to 0 on the 1st of each month

Threshold logic

Spend %	Action
< 50%	Log silently — nothing to surface
≥ 50%	Notify user: "You've used ~50% of your $X budget this month"
≥ 75%	Notify user + suggest which cron skills to pause
≥ 100%	Notify user + automatically pause all cron-scheduled skills except daily-review, morning-briefing, and spend-circuit-breaker itself

At 100%, write circuit_open: true to state. install.sh checks this flag before registering new cron jobs — new installs are allowed, new cron triggers are not.

Circuit reset

To restore automations after a budget reset or manual override:

python3 check.py --reset-circuit

This sets circuit_open: false and re-registers all paused cron jobs.

Model price table

The script ships with a price table for common models (claude-3-5-sonnet, gpt-4o, etc.). To add a custom model:

python3 check.py --add-model my-model-name --input-cost 3.00 --output-cost 15.00

Prices are per million tokens.