An agent that never asks looks faster in a demo. It’s slower the first time it’s wrong.
The shortcut we didn’t take
Early on, we could have let Sutro send every confirmation and place every order on its own. The demos would have been cleaner. But Felix and I had both worked on operations teams where one wrong order meant a week of calls, credits, and apologies. Nobody on those teams would have let software place an order without asking first.
What asking looks like
Sutro stops when a rule says a person decides, like a payment or a price change. It also stops when it isn’t sure, because a document is unclear or two sources disagree. Each time, it says what it found, what it would do, and why.
Why this gets faster over time
Every answer you give is a correction Sutro keeps. The part number it didn’t know gets saved for next time. Approvals don’t disappear. Over time, they land on the cases that need a person’s judgment.
What we’re still getting wrong
Some questions arrive at bad times. We’re working on batching approvals, so a buyer can clear a morning of approvals in one sitting instead of ten separate pings.