12 · Check your understanding

1. Which task is the BEST candidate to automate in a small business?

Deciding whether to give an angry customer a refundSending the same order-confirmation reminder you send for every orderSigning a legal contractHandling a sensitive customer complaint

2. Why should you map a workflow before buying an automation tool?

Because tools are cheaper on weekendsBecause you can't automate a process you can't describe — and automating a messy process just gives you a faster messBecause mapping replaces the need for any toolYou shouldn't; buy the tool first

3. In an automated workflow, what's the division of labor between a no-code tool and an AI assistant?

They do the exact same thingThe no-code tool handles the 'when X, do Y' plumbing; the AI assistant handles language (writing, summarizing)The AI assistant does the plumbing; the tool writes the emailsNeither needs a human to approve anything

4. When should an AI support bot automatically hand off to a human?

Never — that's the point of a botOnly after midnightWhen the customer is upset, asks twice, asks for a person, or the issue involves money or something sensitiveOnly for questions about store hours

5. AI cleaned up your inventory spreadsheet in seconds. What should you do before relying on it?

Nothing — AI doesn't make mistakes on dataSpot-check the result, because a wrong count means a missed sale or a stockout and a wrong number in your books is a real problemDelete your original data immediatelyPublish it as your official records unread

6. When an automation calls an AI model's API, what do you actually pay for?

A one-time flat fee foreverPer token — both your input and the model's output — so a busy automation can run up a real billPer customer onlyNothing; AI APIs are free

7. What does it mean to design an automation for the fact that AI will sometimes be wrong?

Assume AI is always right and skip checksKeep AI off the high-stakes path alone, route low-confidence cases to a human, test on real cases, and build a working fallbackTurn off all monitoring once it works onceLet the bot decide refunds without review

8. Which is a responsible way to handle customer data, per the FTC?

Collect everything 'just in case' and keep it foreverTake stock of what you collect, keep only what you need, lock it down, delete what you don't need, and don't paste it into public AI toolsPaste customer details into any free AI tool to save timeAssume your automation tools handle security so you don't have to think about it

9. Your automation sent a customer a wrong charge. Who is accountable?

The tool — 'the AI did it' settles itNobody, because it was automatedYou — a named human owns the automation, fixes the mistake, and makes it right; 'the AI did it' is not a defenseThe customer, for trusting a bot

10. What's the honest one-line goal of automating your operations?

Remove every human from the businessAutomate the boring, repetitive work so you have more time for what matters — while a human maps, checks, and stays accountable for itUse as many AI tools as possibleHide that you use AI from customers