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Clause 4.2 of the RICS standard Responsible use of artificial intelligence in surveying practice requires a surveyor to make a written decision about the reliability of an AI output, and sets out five things that decision must detail. In guardbook these five sit together in the Oversight Log form, under the heading RICS 4.2 Reliability assessment. All five are required. The entry will not save with any of them blank, and the server checks again before the record is written.
These five fields are about reliability, not about describing the task.The most common mistake is to record the tool, what it was used for, and a note that someone checked it. That is a useful audit record, but it is not what clause 4.2 asks for. Clause 4.2 asks what you assumed, what worried you, why, what could be done about it, and whether the output can be used.

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The five fields

Field 5 carries the most weight. A conclusion is required, not a summary. “The output has some limitations” is not a conclusion. “I am satisfied this can be used for X, subject to Y” is.

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The named surveyor

Clause 4.2 also requires the written decision to be prepared by, or under the supervision of, an appropriately qualified and named surveyor who accepts responsibility for the output’s use. That is the Surveyor field at the top of the form. It is a picker rather than free text, and it draws on the people recorded against your firm. If someone is missing from the list, add them to your People record first.

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A worked example

A valuer uses an AI tool to draft a yield analysis for an industrial unit.
I assumed the comparables the tool drew on were current to Q1 2026, and that the unit’s stated floor area of 1,840 sq ft was correct as given in the instruction.
The tool does not disclose which comparables it used or how recent they are. Industrial yields in this location moved noticeably in the first quarter, and the output may not reflect that.
Two in-house comparables agreed in the last six months show a net initial yield roughly 0.25% below the figure the tool produced. Without visibility of the underlying dataset I cannot tell whether the difference is a data lag or a genuine difference in view.
Cross-referencing against Land Registry data for the past six months and the two in-house comparables. I did this before finalising, and adjusted the yield down by 0.25%.
With that adjustment made and the reasoning recorded, I am satisfied the output can reasonably be used to support the valuation. The unadjusted figure could not have been.
Note what makes this a strong record. It names the assumption rather than implying it. It says what could not be seen, not only what was checked. It states an outcome.

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If the answer is no

Where the conclusion is that the output cannot reasonably be used for its intended purpose, clause 4.2 requires the firm to communicate that conclusion to the client in writing, together with the reasoning or a summary of it.
guardbook records your decision. It does not send that communication for you.Selecting Rejected and writing a conclusion satisfies the internal record. It does not discharge the duty to tell the client. That letter or email is yours to send, and it is worth keeping a copy against the job file.

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When a written decision is needed

The duty bites on outputs that have a material impact on the delivery of the surveying service. That is a judgement on the facts of the use, not a category of tool. An output that summarises a document you then rely on when writing a report is the standard’s own example of a material one. Where AI automates an output or a series of outputs, or produces them in high volume, the standard accepts that a written decision for every output is generally neither necessary nor proportionate. Firms remain accountable for each output, and must instead take randomised dip samples at regular intervals.
Dip sampling is a separate mechanism from an Oversight Log entry, and guardbook does not yet schedule or record dip samples. If your firm relies on the dip sampling route for a high-volume tool, keep a record of the samples you take somewhere durable in the meantime.