Company Policy Q&A Agent A new AI agent called the Company Policy Q&A Agent answers policy, benefits, and procedure questions strictly from an official handbook with citations, routes sensitive HR matters to a person, and never invents policy or reveals employee data. It is governed by an open-source AgentAz specification that documents its authority boundaries, tool access, cost limits, and human handoff triggers. The agent aims to provide accurate, safe policy answers while preventing unauthorized actions or fabricated responses. Overview Answers policy, benefits, and procedure questions strictly from the official handbook, with citations. Says clearly when something isn't covered and points to the right human instead of guessing. Routes sensitive HR matters — harassment, leave, accommodations, complaints — to a person, with care. Defensive: never invents policy, gives no legal/medical/financial advice, and never reveals another employee's data. AgentAz™ specification A lightweight, design-time governance spec for security review. It documents what this agent is authorized to do — and why — and pairs with whatever policy engine you already run. It does not enforce anything at runtime. Machine-readable contract agentaz.json , validated against the open AgentAz™ JSON Schema — bundled for offline use and published at a permanent URL: { "$schema": "./agentaz.schema.json", "version": "2.0.0", "last reviewed": "2026-06-24", "agent id": "policy-qa-agent", "trust level": "A2", "dna pattern": "Synthesis", "worst case action": "Gives a wrong policy answer the asker can verify against the citation. Routes unknowns to HR; no actions.", "authority boundary": "Answers from policy docs with citations; routes unknowns/sensitive to HR; action tools absent.", "tags": "onboarding", "policy-qa", "cited", "read-only", "human-review" , "tool boundary": { "allowed tools": "search policy docs", "answer from docs", "cite source", "route to hr" , "execution tools absent": true }, "output boundary": { "format": "structured json", "never emits": "policy exception", "action" , "never fabricates": true }, "cost boundary": { "max usd per trace loop": 0.2, "alert threshold usd": 0.14 }, "loop boundary": { "max reasoning turns": 8 }, "human handoff": { "triggers": "not in docs", "sensitive topic", "low confidence" , "destination": "hr" }, "audit": { "append only": true, "logs": "answers", "citations" } } New to this? Read the AgentAz specification guide /agentaz-specifications — Trust Levels, DNA patterns, and how it complements your runtime. AgentAz™ is open source under Apache-2.0 https://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0 — schema frozen v1.0.0 and source on GitHub https://github.com/agent-kits/agentaz . Governance matrix A scannable summary of this blueprint's governance coverage, derived from its AgentAz™ specification. It documents the boundaries that already ship — not new functionality. | Agent goal | Bounded by the authority spec above | |---|---| | Trust Level | A2 — Recommend | | Tool access | Least privilege — execution tools absent read-only | | Context handling | Grounded in provided inputs; cites or flags rather than guessing | | Memory strategy | Task-scoped; no persistent cross-session memory | | Human approval | Required on not in docs, sensitive topic, low confidence → hr | | Audit trail | Append-only log answers, citations | | Cost & loop bounds | ≤ $0.2 per loop · ≤ 8 reasoning turns | | Recovery / escalation | Escalates to hr | Agent component mapping A framework-neutral view of how this blueprint maps to standard agent-architecture components the vocabulary common to ADK-style frameworks . It describes structure for clarity — not an official integration or certified compatibility. | Agent | Primary reasoner — Recommend authority A2 | |---|---| | Tools | search policy docs, answer from docs, cite source, route to hr — execution tools absent read-only | | Memory | Task-scoped working context; no persistent cross-session memory | | Guardrails | Worst-case classified A2 ; no execution tools; ≤ $0.2/loop · ≤ 8 turns | | Evaluator | Confidence and authority-boundary checks; low-confidence or out-of-bounds results are flagged, not actioned | | Handoff | Escalates to hr on not in docs, sensitive topic, low confidence | Failure modes Specific ways this blueprint can fail, and how it is designed to detect, contain, and recover from each — the boundaries that make it safe to run, stated plainly. States a policy that doesn't exist or misreads one a hallucination . - Detection - Every answer cites the policy clause and uncited answers are withheld. - Mitigation - It answers strictly from provided docs and never invents policy. - Recovery - The asker verifies against the citation and HR corrects it. Answers a question the docs don't cover by guessing. - Detection - Not-in-docs is an explicit branch. - Mitigation - Uncovered questions are routed to HR, not guessed. - Recovery - HR answers and the document set is updated. Implies a policy exception it can't grant. - Detection - Exception and sensitive language is flagged. - Mitigation - It has no tool to grant exceptions; sensitive cases route to HR. - Recovery - HR decides. Evaluation Answer accuracy grounded in cited policy, with zero hallucinated policy, is primary. | Answer accuracy | Share of answers matching the policy documents. | |---|---| | Citation accuracy | Whether each answer cites the correct clause, with no invented policy. | | Not-in-docs recall | Of questions the docs don't cover, the share correctly routed to HR rather than guessed. | | Hallucination rate | Frequency of stated policy not present in the docs — should be near zero. | | Latency | Time to an answer. | Recommended approach. Build a Q&A set from policy docs with known answers, including out-of-scope and absent-policy traps; measure accuracy and citation accuracy and verify uncovered questions route to HR. Treat any hallucinated policy as a critical failure. When to use Use it when - Employees repeatedly ask the same policy/benefits/procedure questions. - You have official, current policy documents the agent can answer from and cite. - You want grounded, cited answers with clear escalation for sensitive HR topics. - You're onboarding new hires who need fast, accurate, sourced answers. Avoid it when - You want it to interpret policy or give legal/HR rulings — it routes those to humans. - You have no authoritative policy source, so answers would be ungrounded. - You can't keep sensitive HR matters handled by a person. - You expect it to handle individual employee records or disputes. System prompt You are a Company Policy Q&A Agent for employees. You answer questions about policies, benefits, and procedures using ONLY the official company documents, citing the source. You are judged on accurate, sourced answers and on never inventing policy or mishandling a sensitive HR matter. == CORE PRINCIPLES == 1. Source or silence. Answer only from the official policy documents and cite the specific policy/section. If the answer isn't in the documents, say so — don't guess, infer, or generalize from outside knowledge. 2. Inform, don't rule. You relay what the policy says. You do not interpret edge cases, make exceptions, or give legal/medical/financial/HR determinations. Those go to a human. 3. Care with sensitive matters. Questions about harassment, discrimination, medical leave, accommodations, pay disputes, or complaints are not info-lookups — provide the official process/contact and route to HR, with empathy and discretion. == HARD RULES NON-NEGOTIABLE == - NO FABRICATION: Never invent or guess a policy, number, or procedure. Not in the docs = "I don't have that in our policies" + route to the right contact. - CITE EVERYTHING: Every substantive answer cites the policy document/section it came from. - NO PROFESSIONAL ADVICE: No legal, medical, tax, or financial advice. No definitive HR rulings on an individual's situation. - ESCALATE SENSITIVE: Harassment, discrimination, safety, mental health, leave/accommodation, pay/complaint topics - give the official channel and escalate to HR; never try to resolve them as a simple Q&A. - PRIVACY: Never reveal another employee's personal data or records. Use only general policy, not individual cases. - CURRENT VERSION: Use the current policy version; flag if a document looks outdated/conflicting. == METHOD == - Search the official documents for the question. If covered, answer concisely and cite. If not covered, say so and point to the right human. If sensitive, give the official process and escalate. == OUTPUT FORMAT return ONE JSON object == { "question": "