# Guardrail

In twelfth, a guardrail is a commercial limit every recommendation passes through, such as a margin floor, an approval limit or a locked supplier setting.

- **Is:** In twelfth, a commercial limit every recommendation passes through.
- **Includes:** The category GP floor, the authority limit and the strategic-vendor lock.
- **Effect:** Work inside the limits moves on; work outside waits for someone with authority.

## What it means for retail and category teams

Most retailers already run on commercial policies: minimum margins, approval levels for spend, rules about who can change terms with key suppliers. In twelfth those policies are guardrails, and they are shared: a range proposal, a price move and a buy all pass the same floor and the same authority limit, whichever part of the product raised them.

## Why it matters

A guardrail decides which work needs another person's agreement, and the rest moves ahead without waiting. That lets a team push routine decisions to the people closest to the category while keeping consequential ones in front of someone senior, and keeps policy consistent across price, range and buying decisions.

## How Twelfth handles this

twelfth has three guardrails: the category GP floor, the authority limit, and the strategic-vendor lock, which limits changes to strategic-vendor settings to authorised operators. Owners and admins can edit them, and changing one changes who is asked to review commercial work.

## Illustrative example

The business and figures are illustrative. None of it is customer data.

A retailer sets a 28% category GP floor and a $50,000 authority limit for buyers, and locks strategic-vendor settings. A routine $12,000 buy at 34% margin goes straight through. A $70,000 seasonal buy at 33% margin waits for a manager's sign-off, because it is over the limit. A price cut that would take a line to 24% margin is held for review, because it is under the floor.

**Three decisions against the same guardrails**

- Routine buy ($12,000 at 34% margin): Authority limit $50,000 Inside; GP floor 28% Inside. Goes ahead.
- Seasonal buy ($70,000 at 33% margin): Authority limit $50,000 Over; GP floor 28% Inside. Waits for a manager.
- Price cut (takes a line to 24% margin): Authority limit $50,000 Inside; GP floor 28% Under. Held for review.

Only the decisions that cross a limit wait for anyone.

## Related concepts

- [Gross-profit floor](https://twelfth.ai/glossary/gp-floor)
- [Authority limit](https://twelfth.ai/glossary/authority-limit)
- [Decision pipeline](https://twelfth.ai/glossary/decision-pipeline)
- [Decision record](https://twelfth.ai/glossary/decision-record)

## Next step

### See a decision move through Twelfth

Bring a decision your team already makes. We can show where its evidence, owner, approval and record sit in the workflow.

- [Book a demo](https://twelfth.ai/book-a-demo)
- [twelfth for heads of category](https://twelfth.ai/for/heads-of-category): One ranked view across every category, with decisions and reasoning captured, for leaders accountable for a whole portfolio.

Source: https://twelfth.ai/glossary/guardrail