Cost-confidence tiers match the reversibility of an action to the confidence you have in its economics. The tier is stamped on the decision row at the moment of action, so an auditor sees the confidence the agent actually had — not what's known after costs were restated.
The tiers
- Tier A — verified cost: Shopify cost_per_item or manual entry.
- Tier B — estimated cost: AliExpress reverse-image match on the supplier listing.
- Tier C — unknown: no cost data at all.
The one gate that uses it
Most actions run at any tier — a copy rewrite or a draft doesn't put margin at risk. The exception is discount_test, the only price action: it requires Tier A (a verified cost) plus a margin floor, because discounting against an estimated or unknown cost can sell below cost without anyone noticing.
Because the gate is enforced at decision time and the tier is stamped on the decision row, margin policy lives in the code path rather than in a doc nobody reads. See the Action enum for the full move set.