TL;DR:
Assistants make mistakes, especially reading small or blurry numbers. A good correction is quick and specific.
Say what is wrong, say what is right, and point to the part of the screen that shows it.
Check important numbers yourself. A correction fixes this answer, not every later one.
An assistant reads an invoice on your screen and tells you the total is 1,386.00. You can see on the page that it says 1,886.00. Now what? Arguing, starting over, or just ignoring the error are all worse than a short, precise correction.
The short answer
An assistant works from patterns, and it is sometimes confidently wrong. Reading numbers from an image is a common weak spot, because an 8 and a 3 can look alike at small sizes. The good news is that a correction is cheap. You do not need clever wording, you need to be specific and point to the right part.
A vague reply like "that is wrong" gives the assistant almost nothing to work with. It knows something failed, but not what. A useful correction tells it three things: which statement is wrong, what the right value is, and where you see it.
What happens step by step
Notice the mismatch between what it said and what you can see or know.
Name the exact statement that is wrong, for example "you said the total was 1,386.00".
Give the right value and where it is. "The total at the bottom right of the table reads 1,886.00."
Ask it to redo the work that depended on the mistake, not just agree. "Please recheck the tax using that total."
Check the new answer. It should change in the places that depended on the wrong number.
Step four is the one people skip. If the assistant only says "sorry, you are right" without redoing what followed, the earlier calculations may still carry the error.
Walk-through: telling it the number it misread
The invoice has three lines: 1,200.00 for design work, 600.00 for hosting and 86.00 for a domain. The assistant says the total is 1,386.00.
You could check it yourself without any special skill. Add the lines: 1,200.00 + 600.00 = 1,800.00, and 1,800.00 + 86.00 = 1,886.00. The total must be at least 1,800.00 before the last line is even added, so 1,386.00 cannot be right. The assistant probably read the 8 in the hundreds place as a 3.
A weak correction: "That is wrong." A strong one: "The total is 1,886.00, not 1,386.00. The hundreds digit is an 8. It is the last number in the bottom right of the table. Please redo the amount I still owe after the 500.00 deposit."
Redoing the work gives 1,886.00 − 500.00 = 1,386.00. Look at that: the amount still owed happens to be the number the assistant misread. It is a good reminder to check which figure each answer is about, so you do not mix up the total with the balance.
If the assistant now says the balance is 1,386.00, you can verify it by adding back: 1,386.00 + 500.00 = 1,886.00. That matches the total on the page, so the correction took.
What it can't do
Promise it will never repeat the mistake. A correction fixes the conversation you are in. In a new conversation the same blurry digit can be misread again.
Always know it was wrong. It cannot see the screen the way you do, so it may defend a wrong reading. If you are sure, say so and point to it again.
Rescue a source it cannot read. If the image is too small or too blurry, correcting the answer will not help. Zoom in, or type the number yourself.
Check its own arithmetic perfectly. For anything that matters, such as money or dates, do the sum yourself like above.
Tip: When you correct a number, type it out in full and say where it is. "1,886.00, bottom right of the table" is far better than "the other number".
Privacy and control
When you correct an assistant, you often end up quoting the sensitive thing: an account number, an amount, a name. Keep corrections to the minimum needed. You rarely need to retype a full account number to say that one digit was misread, and you can describe which digit instead.
If a correction involves a document, think about whether to keep sharing it. After the fix is made, closing the window or ending the conversation limits what stays in front of the assistant.
Assistants that can draw on your screen, like the blackboard in DuckyHelper, make pointing easier, because you can say "this number" and mean the one you are looking at.
Try it yourself
Show an assistant a short list of numbers, ideally one with a digit that looks ambiguous, and ask for the sum. If it misreads something, practice the strong correction: wrong statement, right value, where it is, and what to redo. Then add the numbers yourself to confirm. The whole exercise takes a few minutes and teaches the habit of verifying anything that matters.
Frequently asked questions
Is it worth correcting, or should I just start over?
Correct it first. A specific correction is faster than rebuilding the conversation. Start over only if the chat has become confusing or very long.
Why does it apologise and then repeat the same error?
Agreeing with you and fixing the work are separate things. Ask it to redo the specific step, and check the result.
Get started
