Fallback state
When a classifying task is uncertain, let it return 'I don't know' rather than forcing a best guess.
Relevant principles
What the research says
Reasoned abstention reads as a safeguard against fabrication and a trust signal; separately, over-confident AI advice inflates user confidence even as accuracy falls, which is exactly what a fallback guards against. 1
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Interactive demo
Northwind help
BotAsk it both of these.
One it can answer from the policy. One it genuinely cannot.
The same bot, twice, with completely different confidence.