Updated regularly · Free
Choosing an AI tool
This is the note our workbooks point at. It exists because a printed list of products goes stale within a year, and because nobody can tell you a tool is safe for your business except you.
We have no affiliate arrangements with anyone. Nothing on this page earns us a commission, and nothing here is a recommendation that a specific product is secure, private, or compliant for your situation.
Start with what you already have
Most people reading this have a phone, an email account and a web browser that already include a general-purpose assistant at no extra cost.
Your first move should use that, not a purchase. If a free tool you already have cannot make your angle work, a paid one probably will not either — and you will have found that out for nothing.
Seven questions that work on any tool
These apply this year and in five years, to products that do not exist yet.
| # | Ask |
|---|---|
| 1 | What happens to what I type in? Is it stored, for how long, and is it used to train anything? If you cannot find a plain answer, that is an answer. |
| 2 | Where is it processed? Relevant to your obligations, and sometimes to your customers’ expectations. |
| 3 | Can I use it without putting customer details in? The best answer is yes — you work with the shape and add the detail yourself. |
| 4 | Can I see and edit the output before anything is sent? If it sends on your behalf, that is the feature to turn off. |
| 5 | Can I try it properly without paying? Enough free use to run your real workflow five times — not a demo. |
| 6 | What happens if I stop paying? Can you get your own material back out? |
| 7 | Would my regulator, scheme or licensing body have a problem with this? For anything touching certification, inspection or notification, ask them before you use it, not after. |
A tool that fails questions 1, 3 or 4 is not a tool to use for customer work, whatever else it does well.
Three things we would not do
Put customer personal data into anything we had not checked. Work with the shape of the message and paste the detail in yourself. Almost all the benefit, almost none of the exposure.
Let anything submit on our behalf. Regulated filings, notifications, scheme returns and permit applications are things a human reads before they go.
Trust a general tool on local rules. Codes and regulations are adopted and amended differently by jurisdiction and on different cycles. A general assistant has no reliable way to know which version applies where you are standing — and it will answer confidently anyway.
Working through a decision?
The 24-Hour AI Decision takes you from “I don’t know if this applies to us” to a written answer in a day.