Frequently asked questions
Straight answers about what your research assistant does, what he deliberately does not do and how your firm stays in control.
Getting started
How does hiring an assistant work?
Browse the assistants, pick one and register your firm. We email you a secure link to verify your work address. Click it and your assistant is engaged with his or her own email address, ready for your first question the same day.
Do I need to install anything?
No. Email is the whole interface. There is no app, no portal and no password to manage. If you can send an email you already know how to use your assistant.
What does it cost?
AbeAI is free during early access. Subscription pricing will be announced before anyone is charged and you will never be billed silently.
Who at my firm can use the assistant?
Your assistant accepts requests only from your firm's approved email addresses, starting with the address you registered. To approve more of your team just contact us.
Can we engage more than one assistant?
Yes. Each assistant works exclusively for one firm but your firm can engage as many assistants as it needs across different specialties.
What your assistant does
What kind of work can I send?
Research questions in plain English, the way you would brief a junior. You can also attach documents (PDF or Word) and ask for a summary or a review, ask several things in one email and reply in the thread with follow-up questions.
How do I know the answers are reliable?
Every research answer comes back with its sources linked so your team can verify each claim before relying on it. Answers are presented as work product for your professional review, not as advice.
How fast are answers?
Most research answers arrive within minutes. When something genuinely takes longer your assistant sends one note to say he is on it and then replies when the result is ready. Nothing is silently dropped.
What your assistant does not do
Can he give legal or financial advice?
No. He researches and reports back with sources. Advice remains the work of your qualified professionals and his answers are inputs to their judgement.
Can he draft court documents, complete applications or lodge filings?
No. He is a research assistant, not a drafting or filing service. He cannot lodge documents, sign anything, complete forms with authorities or move money. Those actions are impossible by design, not just discouraged.
Will he ever contact my clients?
Never. He replies only to your firm's approved addresses. Client communication stays entirely with your team.
What happens if I ask for something he cannot do?
He says so plainly and asks a clarifying question or suggests what he can do instead. When a request is unclear or risky it is escalated to a supervising person rather than guessed at.
Trust and control
Is my client data safe?
Your data stays in Australia, is encrypted everywhere, is deleted on a fixed schedule and is never used to train AI models. The one-screen plain-English version is on our Is my data safe? page.
Who is supervising the AI?
A human team oversees every request and its outcome. Low-confidence or failed requests are flagged for a person to step in, so nothing goes wrong unnoticed.
What if we want to stop?
Stop emailing him. There is no lock-in during early access and you can end the engagement at any time by contacting us.
Something we missed? Contact us and a person will reply, or meet the research assistants when you are ready.