Straight answers · 2 min
How to choose an AI consultancy — the questions that expose the cowboys.
We're an AI consultancy telling you how to interrogate AI consultancies. Use every question on us too — that's rather the point of publishing the interrogation kit.
Straight answers · Updated 24 September 2026
The seven questions
- 'Show me something you built that I can use right now.' Working software beats decks and demo videos. (Our answer: the assistant on this site and the free tools — poke them before believing a word we say.)
- 'What would this cost?' — asked early. Evasion is data. A seller who can't say numbers until they've 'qualified' you is pricing you, not the work. You should hear real figures or honest ranges immediately.
- 'When would you tell me NOT to do this?' The gold-rush tell is a seller with no such answer. Anyone selling AI honestly can describe the customer they'd turn away — fluently, because they've done it.
- 'What exactly does the monthly fee buy, and what happens if I stop paying?' You're listening for whether you'd own something or rent dependence — and whether the tool degrades gracefully or takes your front door with it.
- 'Where does my data go?' A competent builder answers in plain English without flinching: which models, whose terms, what's stored, what's excluded. Hand-waving here predicts hand-waving everywhere.
- 'Who does the work?' Agencies quietly subcontract. That's not automatically bad — but not knowing who's actually building your tool is.
- 'What happens when it fails?' Everything fails sometimes. The professional answer describes fallbacks — hands to a human, takes a message. The cowboy answer is that it won't.
The pattern behind all seven
Every question checks if the seller acts like the truth is affordable. Giving straight numbers, showing work, and honestly answering 'when wouldn't I' can cost a seller in the short term. That's why these are so telling. We can share our kit without worry because our answers to all seven questions are already here: platform prices are published, honest estimates are given in chat before any money changes hands, the process is documented, and refusal rules are built into the AI you'll question. Ask her the tough questions. If any answer wobbles, you've learned something useful at our cost—which is the point.
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