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A rule your staff can read in two minutes.

Six answers turn into a one-page AI policy for your business: what the tools may be used for, what must never be pasted into one, who checks the writing, and what happens when a draft is wrong. Print it, pin it up, hand it to a new starter. Nothing is sent anywhere and nothing needs an account.

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Six answers, one page

Plain choices, not a questionnaire. Every one can be changed later, and the policy updates as you go. Leave a field blank and it stays as a bracket for you to fill in by hand.

If you have saved your details, this is filled in already.

A name and a way to reach them is enough. This appears in section 8.

This is the standard wording. Change an answer above and it rewrites the page.

What this is, and what it is not

A plain-English house rule for a small business. It says what the tools may be used for, what never goes into one, who checks the writing and what to do when something is wrong. That is the whole job of a policy at this size: a person can read it, understand it and follow it.

It is not legal advice. It does not claim to meet any standard, framework or regulation, and it does not replace the rules that already apply to your trade. Employment, data protection and sector rules differ by place and by work. Check the result with your own adviser before you rely on it.

Why one page

A policy nobody reads protects nobody. This one fits on a sheet, prints in black and white, and can be handed over on a first day without a meeting.

The brackets are the point

Where the page was not told something, it leaves a bracket instead of inventing it. That is the same rule the prompts follow: ask for the missing fact, then let a person decide.

AI use policy

How we use AI tools at [BUSINESS NAME]

One page. Reviewed [DATE]. Applies to everyone who works here, including contractors and anyone helping on a job.

1. What this covers

This is the rule for using AI tools for work at [BUSINESS NAME]. An AI tool here means a chat assistant, an image tool, or a writing add-on inside something we already use. It covers everyone who works here, including contractors and anyone helping on a job, whether the tool is on a work device or a personal one.

2. What we use it for

First drafts of writing and admin: replies, quotes, listings, job adverts, social posts, internal notes and checklists. Nothing outside that list is approved. If a job needs something else, ask before you use a tool for it.

3. What it never decides

No AI tool makes a final decision about a customer, a price, a refund, a credit note, a hire, a disciplinary matter, a health concern or a safety concern. A tool can draft the words around a decision. The decision is made by a person, and that person's name goes on it.

4. What never goes into a tool

The facts of the job with names, addresses and contact details removed: the shape of the problem, not the person.

Never paste any of the following, whatever the tool promises about privacy:

  • Names, addresses, phone numbers, email addresses or photographs of customers or staff.
  • Card, bank or account details, invoices, payroll, tax records or anything a finance person would recognise.
  • Access codes, alarm codes, key safe numbers, passwords or gate codes.
  • Medical details, prescriptions, diagnoses, care notes or anything about a child or a vulnerable adult.
  • Identity documents, contracts under negotiation, insurance claims or anything marked confidential.
  • Another business's information, including a supplier's prices or a client's plans.

If you are not sure whether something counts, treat it as if it does. Write the situation out in your own words instead.

5. The rules for the writing itself

  • Use only the facts we supply. If a fact is missing, the draft says it is missing.
  • Never invent a price, a time, a date, an availability, a name, a qualification, a guarantee or a delivery date.
  • No free item, refund, discount, credit or compensation appears in a draft unless the owner has approved that exact offer.
  • No admission of liability, no blaming a named person, and no claim we cannot evidence.
  • Anything a tool writes is a draft. It is read, corrected and owned by the person who sends it.

6. Who checks it

The owner reads anything that will reach a customer, a staff member or the public before it is sent. The check is against the facts, not against how good the writing sounds: the price, the time, the promise and the name.

7. What we keep

The sent version is the record. It is kept with the job, the booking or the customer file, and the draft is not.

8. If something goes wrong

If a draft contains a wrong price, a promise we cannot keep, a detail about a real person, or something that reads as an admission, stop. Do not send a correction on your own. Tell [OWNER NAME] the same day, with the draft and where it went.

9. What this policy is not

It is not legal advice, and it does not claim to meet any particular standard or regulation. Employment, data protection and trade-specific rules vary by place and by work. [BUSINESS NAME] checks those separately with its own adviser, and this page does not override them.

10. Review

Reviewed [DATE]. Next review [DATE], or sooner if the tools change, a new person starts, or something goes wrong.

Written with the free policy builder at seconddraft.dev/tools/ai-policy. Adapt it to your business; it is a starting point, not a legal document.

Both buttons use what is on the page, including any answer you changed. The download is a plain text file, so it opens anywhere and survives a laptop replacement. Printing hides the form and the notes and leaves the policy on one or two sheets.

Doing this by hand instead

1. Decide the four things that matter. What the tools may be used for, what must never go into one, who checks the writing, and who to tell when it is wrong. Those four are the policy; the rest is wording.

2. Keep the list of what never goes in. Names, contact details, card and bank details, access codes, medical or safety detail, identity documents, contracts and anything marked confidential. That list is the part people actually need.

3. Name a person, not a process. “The owner reads it before it goes out” works. “Appropriate review” does not.

4. Put it where the work happens. Print it, pin it near the till or the van keys, and give a copy to a new starter on day one. A policy in a folder nobody opens is a document, not a rule.

5. Review it once a year, and after any mistake. The tools change quickly; the rule should not quietly drift out of date.

Next

A policy is the rule. A prompt is the work.

The policy says what may go into a tool and who checks the output. The prompts do the actual job, and every one of them asks for the missing fact instead of inventing it. If you want to see how that reads before you pay for anything, the three free prompts are in full.

Read the free prompts → Check a draft before you send it → All the free tools →