When to ask a senior

Why this matters for you

AI tools can help you work faster. They cannot take responsibility for a decision. In an office, someone must always be able to say who decided and why. That person is never the chatbot. Knowing when to stop and ask your officer protects citizens, your office and you.

Decisions are not yours to hand to a machine

Some work is a decision, even if it looks like paperwork. For example: whether an application is complete, whether a fee can be waived, whether a complaint is accepted or who gets a service first. Your office has rules and a person responsible for each of these.

• AI may help you understand a rule or write down facts.
• AI must never decide the outcome for you.
• If a chatbot says "this application should be rejected", treat it as a guess. Take the case to your officer.

This is called human oversight: a person checks and decides. See also accountability.

Stop and ask when you see these signs

Ask your officer before you go further if any of these is true:

1. The case involves personal or sensitive details, such as health, money, family disputes, police matters or children.
2. The answer could affect someone's rights or money, such as a refusal, a penalty or a payment.
3. The chatbot's answer does not match the rules you know or two sources say different things.
4. You do not understand the AI's answer well enough to explain it in your own words.
5. The citizen is upset, vulnerable or in urgent need. A person needs a person.
6. Something feels wrong, such as a document that looks altered or a request that seems unusual.

How to ask well

Your officer is busy. A good question saves time.

• Say what the case is, in one or two sentences.
• Say what you checked and what you found.
• Say exactly what you are unsure about.
• If you used AI, say so and show what it suggested. Never present an AI answer as your own checked work.

What you can still do with AI

Asking a senior does not mean you cannot use AI at all. You can still use it, within your office's rules and without personal data, to:

• draft a neutral summary of the facts for your officer
• turn rough notes into a clear note
• explain a general rule in simpler words, which you then check against the official text

Try it

Think of three tasks from your last week at work. For each, decide: is it a routine task where AI could help with the wording or a decision that must go to your officer? Write one sentence explaining why. Discuss your list with a colleague.

Check yourself

1. Give two examples of office work that is really a decision.
2. Name three signs that mean you should stop and ask your officer.
3. What should you tell your officer if you used AI on a case?