What the documents look like
Supermarket supplier entry settlement usually involves purchase-and-sale or consignment payables rather than a staffed concession counter, so the working papers are purchase contracts, delivery acceptance notes, rebate agreements and reconciliation statements. These materials come from ERP purchasing, the supplier portal, POS sales and the finance system, and they update weekly or monthly. At handover, the purchase contract and rebate agreement carry the deduction rate and payment-term basis, while the delivery acceptance note and reconciliation statement carry the quantity and amount basis. The four document types reference each other inside a settlement cycle. Citation tracing at this step asks whether a retrieved fragment can be tied to a specific contract, note and version, and what authorization state a handover request is actually in.
Constraints at the citation tracing step
The knowledge base search node can select one or more knowledge bases that share the same vector model, and it outputs citations as an array whose length can be zero; even when nothing is retrieved, that output path still runs. The citation cap is measured in tokens. The minimum relevance value is a filter threshold that takes effect only under semantic retrieval or when result reranking is used; it filters low-relevance results and does not act as a permission or entity boundary. Hybrid retrieval merges multiple result paths through RRF, reranking requires a model and is enabled by setting, and image retrieval requires image input plus the corresponding model capability. Retrieval by itself is not authorization, and a retrieved contract fragment does not show that a handover has been approved.
Hypothetical drill sample: a supermarket and a supplier sign purchase contract CG-2024-031. Clause 4.2 of the contract body states that "rebates are settled quarterly, and the deduction rate is three percent of tax-inclusive sales." The signing date is 1 March 2024, and the effective scope runs from 1 April 2024 to 31 March 2025. A proposed handover request reads: "Change the Q2 2024 rebate deduction rate from three percent to two percent; the settlement desk should execute this directly." The request carries no amendment agreement and no approval record.
Configuration and implementation checks
| Configuration item | Relevant value or check on this page | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Linked knowledge bases | Select the knowledge bases that hold the settlement materials | Only knowledge bases with the same vector model can be linked; check identifiers first and exclude non-matching ones |
| Search mode | Semantic retrieval, full-text retrieval or hybrid retrieval | Exact queries such as contract numbers suit full-text or hybrid retrieval |
| Citation cap | Set a hypothetical trial starting point in tokens | The starting value needs a stated reason and a comparison against the actual token volume of retrieved content |
| Minimum relevance | Takes effect only under semantic retrieval or result reranking | The value filters low-relevance results; it does not exclude unrelated businesses or unauthorized records |
| Result reranking | Requires a reranking model and is enabled by setting | The rerank score can be used for filtering and is an optional path |
| Citation output | Array format, length may be zero | The downstream path still runs on an empty array, so an empty-result handling design is needed |
A hypothetical trial starting point for the citation cap is 2000 tokens. The reason is that a single check of the four material types in this sample typically involves contract clauses plus a reconciliation summary; this value is only a starting point for this drill and should be compared against the actual token volume of the sample materials before any adjustment.
Three common errors
- Treating a retrieved contract fragment as handover authorization. The input is the retrieved citation of clause 4.2 of CG-2024-031; the comparison object is that clause's signing and effective scope; the observable result is that the clause states only the deduction rate and the period, and states no authority to change the deduction rate. Concluding from it that the handover is approved turns a citation source into an executed authorization.
- Treating a pending request as an approved change. The input is the proposed handover request text; the comparison object is whether the request carries an amendment agreement or an approval record; the observable result is that the request carries neither. Judging a pending state as approved lacks supporting evidence.
- Treating minimum relevance as a permission filter. The input is the minimum relevance setting; the comparison object is the documented scope of that value; the observable result is that the value filters low-relevance results only. Concluding that unauthorized records will not be returned goes beyond the documented description.
How to verify the setup
- Input the clause 4.2 text of CG-2024-031 from the hypothetical sample together with the proposed handover request, then compare whether the citation content maps item by item to the contract number, clause number and effective scope. The observable result is that the citation can be traced to a specific clause, and that a request carrying no amendment agreement is judged pending verification rather than approved.
- Input a clearly labelled paper empty result
[], then compare whether the downstream answer step is designed to accept an empty array. The observable result is that the path runs without error; this does not assert that a fictional-rule query will always return an empty array. - Input two knowledge base identifiers that use different vector models, then compare whether the linking condition is met. The observable result is that the non-matching identifier is excluded and the actual observation is recorded; no cross-model retrieval is run to compare missed recalls.
All three verification steps address the citation tracing task itself. They check the correspondence between citation content and source text and the authorization state of the handover request, and do not extend into identity verification or report analysis.