# Count-Checking Checklist

The Chapter 6 habit in checkable form: **the count is the part you can check, so the count is the part you check.** Synthesis fills gaps. Verification finds them. Run this before anything you synthesize leaves your desk.

## Before the Ask

- [ ] The question is stated in plain language, as a question, not as "analyze this."
- [ ] The columns are named, and the answer shape is requested (per product, per month, with a total row).
- [ ] Only fake rows and descriptions went into the prompt; nothing real. Shape plus five fake rows.

## When the Answer Comes Back

- [ ] The check level matches the stakes (see below). Nothing ships unchecked at the level its stakes require.
- [ ] **Level 3, high stakes (grant, board paper, public record, eligibility, money):** every count and every denominator was checked by hand against the source, or reconciled to an independent total. One count, counted from the top. Exhaustive is the price, and it is the whole skill.
- [ ] **Level 2, medium stakes (internal report, team decision):** all totals and denominators were reconciled to the source; a random or stratified sample of the rest was checked by hand, plus every claim that carries a decision.
- [ ] **Level 1, low stakes (personal summary, convenience digest):** one or two counts by hand and a consistency read of the rest.
- [ ] Every quote was checked against the original text. A paraphrase wearing quotation marks is an offense in miniature. Exact quotes are checked at every level: that rule never scales down.
- [ ] Numbers were checked against a source I trust.
- [ ] The sample size is printed next to any claim made from a small pile. "Not in the data" was never treated as zero.
- [ ] Anything I did not check is labeled as unverified, not assumed true.

## Before It Ships

- [ ] A theme without a count is an opinion; every theme carries its count.
- [ ] A count without a verbatim is a number with no texture; every theme has one exact quote.
- [ ] "What happened" and "why it happened" are in separate sentences. The tool's guesses were not set in the same font as the facts.
- [ ] If money moves on the answer, someone will claim causation, or the data itself is suspect: I escalated to a human with training.
- [ ] My name goes on the digest, and I could defend every number in a meeting.

## The Drill

Chapter 6's Tomás caught one count by hand (61 claimed, 17 real) and one invented quote. Keep the themes, correct the counts, replace the invented quote with a real one you picked yourself. That division of labor is the chapter in one sentence: the agent does the reading, you do the verifying.

A 30-row sample ticket export to practice on ships in the kit's `data/` folder as `tickets-sample.csv`.