Certificate lapse is the expiry of an AI agent's certificate when its fixed term runs out without a fresh certification to replace it. In our model the term is 90 days from issue. At lapse, the authority the certificate granted ends, and the agent falls back to depth 1 until it is certified again.
Why does certificate lapse matter?
Evidence goes stale. The cases an agent was certified on came from the business as it was: its products, policies, customers and sources at that time. Three months later, prices have changed, a policy has been rewritten, a new type of complaint has appeared. The agent may still be fine. Nobody knows until it is tested again.
A fixed expiry turns that uncertainty into a schedule. Without one, a certificate becomes a badge that outlives the evidence behind it, and an agent keeps acting on authority it proved against a business that no longer exists. The reasoning is set out in why does an agent certificate lapse?
How does lapse work in practice?
- A certificate is issued with an expiry date.
- Monitoring runs throughout, watching for drift and failures.
- Ahead of the date, the owner refreshes the set of cases and schedules a new run.
- If the run passes, a new certificate replaces the old one with no gap.
- If no passing run exists by the expiry date, the certificate lapses.
- From that moment, actions above depth 1 are refused or held, and each verdict names the lapsed certificate as the bound that decided.
The practical steps for avoiding a gap are in how to renew an AI agent's certificate before it lapses.
What does that look like in an example?
A lender's collections agent is certified at depth 3 to agree standard payment plans. The renewal run is booked for the week before expiry, but the set of cases has not been refreshed and the run is postponed. The certificate lapses on a Friday. On Monday every payment plan the agent would have agreed is held for the collections team, and a queue builds by lunchtime. Nothing went wrong with the agent; the business let its evidence expire. The team now schedules renewal three weeks ahead.
How is lapse different from a failed run?
Lapse is scheduled. It says nothing about the agent's performance, only that the evidence is out of date. A failed run is evidence against the agent: it scored below a floor on at least one gate, and in our model it keeps only the highest depth the run cleared, or drops to depth 1 the same day if it cleared none. Both remove authority, but they call for different responses. After a lapse, you renew. After a failure, you find the cause, fix the brief, sources or bounds, and certify again.
Which related terms should you know?
- Agent certificate: the record that lapses.
- Recertification: the new run that replaces it.
Lapse also applies per customer. An agent certified for several customers has a separate certificate, and a separate expiry, for each, a point explained in can one agent certificate cover every customer? The full approach is in what it means to certify an agent.
Where Pryme fits
In Pryme, certificates lapse 90 days after issue. When one lapses, the certificate becomes the lowest bound in the minimum chain, so actions above depth 1 are held or refused and each verdict names the lapsed certificate. Renewal runs in Attest on freshly filed cases, and a passing run issues the new certificate before the old one ends.
Questions people ask
Why a fixed term rather than "until something changes"?
Because many changes are not noticed. A fixed term guarantees the evidence is refreshed even when nobody flagged a reason to. Earlier recertification is still required when you know something has changed.
Does a lapsed certificate disappear from the record?
No. It stays on file with its dates and results, so any action taken under it can be checked later. The AI agent certificate template includes the lapse date for that reason.