Model Routing for Support Bots: Cheap-First FAQ Handling

Cheap-first routing sends routine support questions to a small, inexpensive model and escalates selected hard or uncertain requests to a stronger one. This guide compares the three application-side routing patterns, separates what your application owns from what OpenRouter’s Auto Router and model fallbacks handle, walks through a support flow with a copyable request, and sets out how to measure escalation rate and cost per resolved ticket.