The customer cannot override it.
No setting, plan tier, or support request turns a refusal into a placement. Honesty is not a reseller toggle.
The refusal
An answer the evidence cannot support is not an answer.
The refusal is not an error state. It is the product working.
Placement readIllustrative refusal · invented data
ResultInsufficient basis to place
Levelnull
Confidencenull
Scorenull
Three enterprise properties
A refusal is valuable because it holds under pressure.
Branding, contract value, and workflow convenience do not weaken the boundary.
The subject can resolve it.
The person can confirm their own record. The candidate is a party to the read, not a target of it.
The refusal is auditable.
Reason, evidence state, timestamp, and receipt support later review of why the instrument returned nothing.
The machine-readable contract
A downstream system cannot read a hidden answer because no answer exists.
The response keeps sources found, sources bound, and sources not read separate. It carries permitted use on the wire.
Purpose gating is data.
placement.read · response
{
"placement": "INSUFFICIENT_BASIS_TO_PLACE",
"level": null,
"confidence": null,
"score": null,
"reasons": [
"subject_confirmation_not_obtained"
],
"sources_found": 6,
"sources_bound": 0,
"sources_not_read": 2,
"permitted_use": ["none"],
"receipt": "rcpt_01K7...e3a"
}No level is withheld, cached, previewed, or available on a second call.
Subject resolution
The one path that can change the answer belongs to the subject.
The person can confirm the record that should be read. The customer cannot substitute an attestation for that confirmation.
RequestThe subject receives the record confirmation request.
ConfirmThe subject identifies the properties and record that belong to them.
Re-readThe instrument evaluates the newly confirmed record under the same rules.
Use restriction
A refusal protects the subject and the decision maker.
It prevents an automated pipeline from converting uncertainty into a person score or a narrative equivalent.
Operationalize the boundary
Carry the refusal into the systems that make the decision.
See the protocol, hiring-system attachment, and governance console envisioned for enterprise delivery.